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THE OYTSY SERIE© 




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GYPSY’S COUSIN JOY. 



EV^STTJART'^P HELPS, ti/o^ 

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AUTHOR OF “ GYPSY BKEYNTON.” 






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BOSTON: 

GRAVES AND YOUNG, 

24 CORNHILL. 

1 8 6 6 . 

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Entered according? to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by 
GRAVES & YOUNG, 

In the Clerk’s Oflace for the District Court of Massachusetts. 




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J. E, Fabwkll & Co. 
Stereotypers and Printers, 
Congress Street. 


THE GYPSY BREYNTON SERIES 


“GYPSY BHEYNTON.” 


“GYPSY’S COUSIN JOY:” 

In which Joy comes to Yorkbury. 


“GYPSY’S SOWING AND REAPING:” 

Which concerns Gypsy and Tom. 


“GYPSY’S YEAR AT THE GOLDEN 
CRESCENT : ” 

In which Gypsy goes to boarding-school. 



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CONTENTS, 


D 


News 

CHAPTER I. 


CHAPTER II. 

Shall she come? . 


One Evening . 

CHAPTER III. 

Chestnuts . 

CHAPTER IV. 


CHAPTER V. 


Gypsy makes a Discovery . 


Who put it in? 

CHAPTER VI. 


CHAPTER Vn. 


Peace Maythorne’s Room 


10 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER VIII. 

The Story of a Night . . • . ^ 146 

CHAPTER IX. 

Up Rattlesnake .... 183 

CHAPTER X. 

We are LostI ..... 205 

CHAPTER XI. 

Grand Times ..... 223 

CHAPTER XII. 

A Telegram ..... 237 

CHAPTER XIII. 

A Sunday Night . . . . 257 

CHAPTER XIV. 


Good-by 


268 


GYPSY’S COUSIN JOY. 


CHAPTER I. 


NEWS. 



second arithmetic class had just 
come out to recite, when somebody 
knocked at the door. Miss Cardrew 
sent Delia Guest to open it. 

<‘It’s a — ha, ha! letter — he he! for you,” 
said Delia, coming up to the desk. Exactly 
wherein lay the joke, in the fact that Miss Car- 
drew should have a letter, nobody but Delia was 
capable of seeing ; but Delia was given to see- 
ing jokes on all occasions, under all circum- 
stances. Go wherever you might, from a 
prayer-meeting to the playground, you were 
sure to hear her little giggle. 

11 



12 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“A letter for you,” repeated Delia Guest. 
“ He, he I ” 

Miss Cardrew laid down her arithmetic, 
opened the letter, and read it. 

“ Gypsy Breynton.” 

The arithmetic class stopped whispering, and 
there was a great lull in the school-room. 

Why I never ! ” giggled Delia. Gypsy, all 
in a flutter at having her name read right out 
in school, and divided between her horror lest 
the kitten she had tied to a spool of thread at 
recess, had been discovered, and an awful 
suspicion that Mr. Jonathan Jones saw her run 
across his ploughed field after chestnuts, went 
slowly up to the desk. 

“ Your mother has sent for you to come di- 
rectly home,” said Miss Cardrew, in a low tone. 
Gypsy looked a little frightened. 

“ Go home I Is any body sick. Miss Car- 
drew?” 

“She doesn’t say, — she gives no reasons. 
You’d better not stop to talk, Gypsy.” 


NEWS. 


13 


Gypsy went to her desk, and began to gather 
up her books as fast as she could. 

“ I shouldn’t wonder a bit if the house ’d 
caught afire,” whispered Agnes Gaylord. “ I 
had an uncle once, and his house caught afire, 
— in the chimney too, and everybody ’d gone to 
a prayer-meeting; they had now, true’s you 
live.” 

“ Maybe your father’s dead,” condoled Sarah 
Rowe. 

“ Or Winnie.” 

“ Or Tom.” 

“ Just think of it ! ” 

“ What do you s’pose it is ? ” 

If I were you, I guess I’d be frightened ! ” 

“ Of der ! ” said Miss Cardrow, in a loud 
voice. The girls stopped whispering, and 
Gypsy in nowise reassured by their sympathy, 
hmTied out to put on her things. With her 
hat thrown on one side of her head, the strings 
hanging down into her eyes, her sack rolled 


14 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


up in a bundle under her arm, and her rub- 
bers in her pocket, she started for home on the 
full run. Yorkbury was pretty well used to 
Grypsy> but everybody stopped and stared at 
her that morning; what with her burning 
cheeks, and those rubbers sticking out of her 
pocket, and the hat-strings flying, and the 
brambles catching her dress, and the mud 
splashing up under her swift feet, it was no 
wonder. 

“Miss Gypsy!” called old Mr. Simms, the 
clerk, as she flew by the door of her father’s 
book store. “ Miss Gypsy, my dear ! ” 

But on ran Gypsy without so much as giving 
him a look, across the road, in front of a car- 
riage, around a load of hay, and away like a 
bird down the street. Out ran Gypsy’s pet 
aversion, Mrs. Surly, from a shop door some- 
where, — 

“ Gypsy Breynton, what a sight you be I I 
believe you’re gone clear crazy, — Gypsy ! ” 


NEWS. 


15 


‘‘ Can’t stop!” shouted Gypsy, “ it’s a fire 
or something somewhere.” 

Eight small boys at the word “ fire” appeared 
on the instant from nobody knew where, and 
ran after her with hoarse yells of ‘ ‘ fire ! fire ! 

Where’s the engine ? Vi ir - r - ! ” By 

this time too, three dogs and a nanny-goat were 
chasing her ; the dogs were barking, and the 
nanny-goat was baaing or braying, or whatever 
it is that nanny-goats do, so she swept up to the 
house in a unique, triumphal procession. 

Winnie came out to meet her as she came in 
at the gaterpanting and scarlet-faced. 

Fifty years instead of five, might Winnie have 
been at that moment, and all the cares of Church 
and State on the shoulders of his pinafore, to 
judge from the pucker in his chin. There was 
always a pucker in Winnie’s chin, when he felt, 
— as the boys call it — ‘‘ big.” 

“ What do s’pose, Gypsy? — don’t you wish 
you knew ? ” 

“What?” 


16 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ Oh, no matter. Iknow.’’ 

“ Winnie Breynton I ” 

“ Well,” said Winnie, with the air of a Grand 
Mogul feeding a chicken, “ I don’t care if I tell 
you. We’ve had a temmygral.” 

“ A telegram ! ” 

“I just guess we have, you’d oughter seen 
the man. He’d lost his nose, and — ” 

“A telegram I Is there any bad news? 
Where did it come from ? 

“ It came from Bosting,” said Winnie, with a 
superior smile. “I s’posed you knew that! 
It’s sumfin about Aunt Miranda, I shouldn’t 
wonder.” 

“Aunt Miranda I Is any body sick? Is 
anybody dead, or anything? ” 

“I don’t know,” said Winnie, cheerfully. 
“ But I guess you wish you’d seen the envelope. 
It had the funniest little letters punched through 
on top — it did now, really.” 

Gypsy ran into the house at that, and left 
Winnie to his meditations. 


NEWS. 


17 


Her mother called her from over the ban- 
isters, and she ran up stairs. A small trunk 
stood open by the bed, and the room was filled 
with the confusion of packing. 

“ Your Aunt Miranda is sick,” said Mrs. 
Breynton. 

“ What are you packing up for ? You’re not 
going off I” exclaimed Gypsy, incapable of 
taking in a greater calamity than that, and 
quite forgetting Aunt Miranda. 

“Yes. Your uncle has written for us to 
come right on. She is very sick, Gypsy.” 

“Oh,” said Gypsy, penitently, “danger- 
ous?” 

“Yes.” 

Gypsy looked sober because her mother did, 
and she thought she ought to. 

“Your father and I are going in this 
noon train,” proceeded Mrs. Breynton, rolling 
up a pair of slippers, and folding a wrapper 
away in the trunk. “ I think I am needed. 


2 


18 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


The fever is very severe ; possibly — con- 
tagious,” said Mrs. Breynton, quietly. Mrs, 
Breynton made it a rule to have very few con- 
cealments' from her children. All family plans 
which could be, were openly and frankly dis- 
cussed. She believed that it did the children 
good to feel that they had a share in them ,* that 
it did them good to be trusted. She never kept 
bad tidings from them simply because they were 
bad. The mysteries and prevarications neces- 
sary to keep an unimportant secret, were, she 
reasoned, worse for them than a little anxiety. 
Gypsy must know sometime about her aunt’s 
sickness. She preferred she should hear it from 
her mother’s lips, see for herself the reasons for 
this sudden departure and risk, if risk there 
were, and be woman enough to understand 
them. 

Gypsy looked jsober now in earnest. 

‘ < Why mother ! How can you ? What if 
you catch it?” * 


NEWS. 


19 


“There is very little chance of that; one 
possibihty in a hundred, perhaps. Help me 
fold up this dress, Gypsy, — no, on the bed — 
so.” 

“But if you should get sick! I don’t see 
why you need go. She isn’t your own sister 
anyway, and she never did anything for us, Mor 
cared anything for us.” 

“ Your uncle wants me, and that is enough. 
I want to be to her a sister if I can, — poor 
thing, she has no sister of her own, and no 
mother, nobody but hired nurses with her ; and 
she may die, Gypsy. If I can be of any help, 
I am glad to be.” 

Her mother spoke in a quiet, decided tone, 
with which Gypsy knew there was no arguing. 
She helped her fold her dresses and lock her 
trunk, very silently, for Gypsy, and then ran 
away to busy herself with Patty in getting the 
travellers’ luncheon. When Gypsy felt badly, 
she always hunted up something to do ; in this 


20 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


she showed the very best of her good sense. 
And let me tell you, girls, as a little secret, — 
in the worst fits of the ‘ ‘ blues ” you ever 
have, if you are guilty of having any, do 
you go straight into the nursery and build a 
block house for the baby, or up stairs and help 
your mother baste for the machine, or into the 
dining-room to help Bridget set the table, or 
into the corner wheye some diminutive brother 
is crying over his sums which a very few words 
from you would straighten, or into the parlor 
where your father sits shading his eyes from the 
lamp-light, with no one to read him the paper ; 
and before you know it, you will be as happy 
as a queen. You don’t believe it? Try and 
see. 

Gypsy drowned her sorrow at her mother’s 
departure, in broiling her mutton-chops and cut- 
ting her pie, and by the time the coach drove 
to the door, and the travellers stood in the entry 
with bag and baggage, all ready to start, the 


NEWS. 


21 


smiles had come back to her lips, and the 
twinkle to her eyes. 

“ Good-by father ! O — oh, mother Breyn- 
ton, give me another kiss. There ! — one more. 
Now if you don’t write just as soon as you get 
there ! ” 

“ Be a good girl, and take nice care of Win- 
nie,” called her mother, from the coach-window. 
And then they were driven rapidly away, and 
the house seemed to grow still and dark all at 
once, and a great many clouds to be in the 
warm, autumn sky. The three children stood a 
moment in the entry looking forlornly at each 
other. I beg Tom’s pardon — I suppose I should 
have said the two children and the “young 
man.” Probably never again in his life will 
Tom feel quite as old, as he felt in that six- 
teenth year. Gypsy was the first to break the 
dismal silence. 

“ How horrid it’s going to be ! You go up 
stairs and she won’t be there, and there’ll be no- 


22 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


body coming home from the^ store at night, and, 
then — you go round, and it’s so still, and no- 
body but me to keep house, and Patty has just 
what she likes for breakfast, for all me, and I 
think Aunt Miranda needn’t have gone and been 
sick, anyway.” 

‘‘A most sensible and sympathizing niece,” 
observed Tom, in his patronizing way. 

“ Well you see, I suppose I don’t care very 
much about Aunt Miranda,” said Gypsy, con- 
fidentially. “ I’m sorry she’s sick, but I didn’t 
have a bit nice time in Boston last vacation, 
and she scolded me dreadfully when I blew out 
the gas. What is it, Patty ? Oh yes — come 
to dinner, boys.” 

“ I say,” remarked Winnie, at the rather 
doleful dinner-table, — 

“Look here, Gypsy.” 

“mat?” 

“ S’posin’ when they’d got Aunt ^Miranda all 
nailed into her coffin — tight in, she should be 


NEWS. 


23 


«w-cleacled, and open her eyes, and begin •*— 
begin to squeal, you know. S’pose they’d let 

# 

Just four days from the morning Mrs. 
Breynton left, Tom came up from the office 
with a very sober face and a letter. 

Gypsy ran out to meet him, and put out her 
hand, in a great hurry to read it. 

“ I’ll read it to you,” said Tom, “ it’s to me. 
Come into the parlor.” 

They went in, and Tom read : — 


** My dear Son : — 

I write in great haste, just to let you know 
that your Aunt Miranda is gone. She died last 
night at nine o’clock, in great distress. I was 
with her at the last. I am glad I came — very ; 
it seems to have been a comfort to her ; she was 
so lonely and deserted. The funeral is day after 
to-morrow, and we shall stay of course. We 
hope to be home on Monday. There has been 
no time yet to make any plans ; I can’t tell what 


24 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


the family will do. Poor Joy cannot bear to be 
left alone a minute. She follows me round like 
a frightened child. The tears come into my eyes 
every time I look at her, for the thoughts of 
three dear, distant faces that might be left just 
so, but for God’s mercy to them and to me. She 
is just about Gypsy’s age and height, you know. 
The disease proved not to be contagious, so you 
need feel no anxiety. A kiss to both the chil- 
dren. Your father sends much love. We shall 
be glad to get home and see you again. 

Very' lovingly. 

Mother.” 

Inside the note, was a slip for Gypsy with 
this written on it : — 

“ I must stop to tell you Gypsy, of a little thing 
your aunt said the day before she died. She had 
been speaking of Joy in her weak, troubled 
way, — of some points wherein she hoped she 
would be a different woman from her mother, and 
had then lain still awhile, her eyes closed, some- 


NEWS. 


25 


thing — as you used to say when you were a 
little girl — very sorry about her mouth, when 
suddenly she turned and said ‘ I wish Td made 
Gypsy^s visit here a little pleasanter. Tell her 
she must think as well as she can of her auntie, 
for Joy^s sake now/ ” 

Gypsy folded up the paper, and sat silent a 
moment, thinking her own thoughts, as Tom 
saw, and not wishing to be spoken to. 

• Those of you who have read ‘ ‘ Gypsy Breyn- 
ton ” will understand what these thoughts mi^ht 
be. Those who have not, need only know that 
Gypsy’s aunt had been rather a gay, careless 
lady, well dressed and jewelled, and fond enough 
of dresses and jewels ; and that in a certain visit 
Gypsy made her not long ago, she had been far 
from thoughtful of her country niece’s comfort. 

And this was how it had ended. Poor Aunt 
Miranda ! 

“Well,” said Gypsy, at last, with something 
dim in her eyes, “ I dare say I was green and 


26 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


awkward, and it was half my fault. I never 
could understand how people could just turn 
round when anybody dies, and say they were 
good and perfect, when it wasn’t any such a 
thing, and I can’t say I think she was, for it 
would be a lie. But I wont say anything more 
against her. Poor Joy, poor Joy ! Not to have 
any mother, Tom, just think ! Oh, just think ! ” 


CHAPTER II. 


SHALL SHE COME ? 


S UPPER was ready. It had been ready 
now for ten minutes. The cool, white 



cloth, bright glass, glittering silver, and 


^ delicate china painted with a primrose 
and an ivy-leaf, — the best china, and very ex- 
travagant in Gypsy of course, but she thought 
the occasion deserved it, — were all laid in their 
places upon the table. The tea was steeped to 
precisely the right point ; the rich, mellow 
flavor had just escaped the clover taste on one 
side, and the bitterness of too much boiling on 
the other ; the delicately sugared apples were 
floating in their amber juices in the round glass 


27 


28 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


preserve-dish, the smoked halibut was done to 
the most delightful brown crispness, the puffy, 
golden drop-cakes were smoking from the oven, 
and Patty was growling as nobody but Patty 
could growl, for fear they would “ slump down 
intirely an’ be gittin’ as heavy as lead,” before 
they could be eaten. 

There was a bright fire in the dining-room 
grate ; the golden light was dancing a jig all 
over, the walls, hiding behind the curtains, co- 
quetting with the silver, and touching the 
primroses on the plates to a perfect sunbeam ; 
for father and mother were coming. Tom and 
Gypsy and Winnie were all three running to 
the windows and the door every two minutes 
and dressed in their very ‘ ‘ Sunday-go-to-meet- 
ing best ; ” for father and mother were coming. 
Tom had laughed well at this plan of dressing 
up — Gypsy’s notion of course, and ridiculous 
enough, said Tom ; fit for babies like Winnie, 
and girls. (I wish I could give you in print, 


SHALL SHE COME? 


29 


the peculiar emphasis with which Tom was wont 
to dwell on this word.) But for all that, when 
Gypsy came down in her new Scotch plaid 
dress, with her cheeks so red, and her hair so 
smooth and black ; and Winnie strutted across 
the room counting the buttons on his best jacket, 
Tom slipped away to his room, and came down 
with his purple neck-tie on. 

It made a pretty, homelike picture — the 
bright table and the firelight, and the eager faces 
at the window, and the gay dresses. Any 
father and mother might have been glad to call 
it all their own, and come into it out of the 
cold and the dark, after a weary day’s journey. 

These cosey, comfortable touches about it — 
the little conceit of the painted china, and the 
best clothes — were just like Gypsy. Since 
she was glad to see her father and mother, it 
was imperatively necessary that she should show 
it ; there was no danger but what her joy would 
have been sufficiently evident — where everything 


30 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


else was — in her eyes ; but according to Gypsy’s 
view of matters, it must express itself in some 
sort of celebration. Whether her mother 
wouldn’t have been quite as well pleased if her 
delicate, expensive porcelain had been kept 
safely in the closet; whether indeed, it was ex- 
actly right for her to take it out without leave, 
Gypsy never stopped to consider. When she 
wanted to do a thing, she could never see any 
reasons why it shouldn’t be done, like a few 
other girls I have heard of in New England. 
However, just such a mother as Gypsy had, 
was quite likely to pardon such a little careless- 
ness as this, for the love in it, and the welcom- 
im? thoughts. 

o o 

“They’re cornin’, cornin’, cornin’,” shouted 
Winnie, from the door-steps, where, in the ex- 
uberance of his spirits he was trying very hard 
to stand on his head, and making a most re- 
markable failure, “they’re cornin’ lickitycut, 
and I’m five years old ’n’ I’ve got on my best 
jacket, ’n’ they’re cornin’ slam bang I ” 


SHALL SHE COME? 


31 


‘ ‘ Coming, coming, coming ! ” echoed Gypsy, 
about as wild as Winnie himself, and flying past 
him down to the gate, leaving Tom to follow in 
Tom’s own dignified way. 

Such a kissing, and laughing, and talking, 
and delightful confusion as there was then ! 
Such a shouldering of bags and valises and 
shawls, such hurrying of mother in out of the 
cold ; such a pulling of father’s whiskers, such 
peeping into mysterious bundles, and pulling 
off of wrappers, and hurrying Patty with the 
tea-things ; and questions and answers, and 
everybody talking at once, — one might have 
supposed the travellers had been gone a month 
instead of a week. 

“My kitty had a fit,” observed Winnie, in 
the first pause he could find. 

“ And there are some letters for father,” — 
from Tom. 

“ Patty has a new beau,” interrupted Gypsy. 

“ It was an awfully fit,” put in Winnie, undis- 


32 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


couraged, “ she rolled under the stove V I tell 
you she squealed, and — ” 

“ How is uncle? ” asked Tom, and it was the 
first time any one had thought to ask. 

“ Then she jumped — splash ! into the hogs- 
head,” continued Winnie, determined to finish. 

“ He is not very well,” said IVIr. Breynton, 
gravely, and then they sat down to supper, talk- 
ing the while about him. Winnie subsided in 
great disgust, and devoted himself, body, mind, 
and heart, to the drop-cakes. 

“Ah, the best china, I see,” said Mrs. Breyn- 
ton, presently, with one of her pleasantest 
smiles, and, as Mrs. Brenton’s smiles were 
always pleasant, this was saying a great deal. 
“ And the Sunday things on too, — in honor of 
our coming ? How pleasant it all seems ! and 
how glad I am to be at home again.” 

Gypsy looked radiant, — very much in fact, 
like a little sun dropped down from the sky, or 
a jewel all ablaze. 


SHALL SHE COME? 


33 


Some mother’s would have reproved her for 
the use of the china ; some who had not quite 
the heart to reprove, would have said they were 
sorry she had taken it out. Mrs. Breynton 
would rather have had her handsome plates 
broken to atoms, than to chill by so much as a 
look, the glow of the child’s face just then. 

There was decidedly more talking than eat- 
ing done at supper, and they lingered long at 
the table, in the pleasant firelight and lamp- 
light. 

“ It seems exactly like the resurrection day 
for all the world,” said Gypsy. 

‘ ‘ The resurrection day ! ” 

‘ ‘ Why yes ; when you went off I kept 
thinking everybody was dead and buried, all 
that morning, and it was real horrid, — Oh, you 
don’t know ! ” 

“ Gypsy,” said Mrs. Breynton, awhile after 
supper, when Winnie had gone to bed, and Tom 


8 


34 


gypsy’s cousin jc^y. 


and his father were casting accounts bj the fire, 
“ I want to see you a few minutes.” 

Gypsy wondering, followed her into the 
parlor. Mrs. Breynton shut the door, and they 
sat down together on the sofa. 

“ I want to have a talk with you, Gypsy, 
about something that we’d better talk over 
alone.” 

“ Yes’m,” said Gypsy, quite bewildered by 
her mother’s grave manner, and thinking up all 
the wrong things she had done for a week. 
Whether it was the time she got so provoked at 
Patty for having dinner late, or scolded Win- 
nie for trying to paint with the starch, (and if 
ever any child deserved it, he did,) or got kept 
after school for whispering, or brought down 
the nice company quince marmalade to eat with 
the blanc-mange, or whether — 

“You havn’t asked about your cousin Joy,” 
said her mother, interrupting her thinking. 

“Oh, — how is she?” said Gypsy, looking 
somewhat ashamed. 


SHALL SHE COME? 


35 


“ I am sorry for the child,” said Mrs. Breyn- 
ton, musingly. 

“ What’s going to become of her? Who’s 
going to take care of her ? ” 

‘ ‘ That is just what I came in here to talk 
about.” 

“ Why, I don’t see what I have to do with 
it ! ” said Gypsy, astonished. 

“ Her father thinks of going abroad, and so 
there would be no one to leave her with. He 
finds himself quite worn out by your aunt’s sick- 
ness, the care and anxiety and trouble. His 
business also requires some member of the firm 
to go to France this fall, and he has almost de- 
cided to go. The only thing that makes him 
hesitate, is Joy.” 

“ I see what you mean now, mother, — I see 
it in your eyes. You want Joy to come here.” 
Gypsy spoke in a slow, uncomfortable way, as 
if she were trying very hard not to believe her 
own words. 


36 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ Yes, ’ said Mrs. Breynton, “ that is it.” 

Gypsy’s bright face fell. 

“ Well ? ” she said, at last. 

“ I told your uncle,” said her mother, “ that 
I could not decide on the spot, but would let 
him know next week. The question of Joy’s 
coming here will affect you more than any 
member of the family, and I thought it only 
fair to you, that we should talk it over frankly, 
before it is settled.” 

Gypsy had a vague notion that all mothers 
would not have been so thoughtful, but she said 
nothing. 

“ I do not wish,” proceeded Mrs. Breynton, 
“ to make any arrangement in which you 
cannot be happy; but I have great faith in 
your kind heart, Gypsy.” 

“ I don’t like Joy,” said Gypsy, bluntly. 

“ I know that, and I am sorry it is so,” said 
her mother. “ I understand just what Joy is. 
But it is not all her fault. She has not been 


SHALL SHE COME? 


37 


trained just as you have, Gypsy. She was 
never taught and helped to be a generous, 
gentle child, as you have been taught and 
helped. Your uncle and aunt felt differently 
about these things ; but it is no matter about 
that now, — you will understand it better when 
you are older. It is enough for you to know 
that Joy has great excuse for her faults. Even 
if they were twice as great as they are, one 
wouldn’t think much about them now ; the poor 
child is in great trouble, lonely and frightened 
and motherless. Think, if God took away 
your mother, Gypsy.” 

“ But Joy didn’t care much about her 
mother,” said honest Gypsy. “ She used to 
scold her, Joy told me so herself. Besides I 
heard her, ever so many times.” 

“ Peace be with the dead, Gypsy ; — let all 
that go. She was all the mother Joy had, and 
if you had seen what I saw a night or two 
before I came away, you wouldn’t say she didn’t 
love her.” 


38 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ What was it? ” asked Gypsj. 

“ Your auntie was lying all alone, up stairs. 
I went in softly, to do one or two little things 
about the room, thinking no one was there. 

“One faint gas-light was burning, and in the 
dimness, I saw that the sheet was turned down 
from the face, and a poor little quivering figure 
was crouched beside it on the bed. It was Joy. 
She was sobbing as if her heart would break, 
and such sobs — it would have made you cry to 
hear them, Gypsy. She didn’t hear me come 
in, and she began to talk to the dead face 
as if it could hear her. Do you want to know 
what she said ? ” 

Gypsy was looking very hard the other way. 
She nodded, but did not speak, gulping down 
something in her throat. 

“ This was what she said — softly, in Joy’s 
frightened way, you know. ‘ You’re all I had, 
any way,’ said she. ‘ All the other girls have 
got mothers, and now I wont ever have any, 


SHALL SHE COME? 


39 


any more. I did used to bother you and be 
cross about my practising, and not do as you 
told me, and I wish I hadn’t, and — ’ 

“Oh — hum, look here — mother,” inter- 
rupted Gypsy, jumping up and winking very 
fast. ‘ ‘ Isn’t there a train up from Boston 
early Monday morning? She might come in 
that, you know.” 

]\Irs. Breynton smiled : 

“ Then she may come, may she?” 

“ I rather think she may,” said Gypsy, with 
an emphasis. “ I’ll write her a letter and tell 
her so.” 

‘ ‘ That will be a good plan , Gypsy. But you 
are quite sure ? I don’t want you to decide this 
matter in too much of a hurry.” 

“ She’ll ^leep in the front room of course? ” 
suggested Gypsy. 

“ No ; if she comes, she must sleep with you. 
M^ith our family and only one servant, I could 
hardly keep up the extra work that would 
cause, for six months or a year.” 


40 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


‘ ‘ Six months or a year ! In my room ! ” 

Gypsy walked back and forth across the 
room two or three times, her merry forehead all 
wrinkled into a knot. 

“ Well,” at last, “ I’ve said it, and I’ll stick 
to it, and I’ll try to make her have a good time, 
anyway.” 

“ Come here, Gypsy.” 

Gypsy came here, and one of those rare, soft 
kisses — very different from the ordinary, every 
day kisses — that her mother gave her when she 
hadn’t just the words to say how pleased she was, 
fell on her forehead, and smoothed out the knot 
before you could “ say Jack Robinson.” 

That very afternoon Gypsy wrote her note 
to Joy : — 

** Dear Joy ; 

I’m real sorry your mother died. You’d 
better come right up here next week, and we’ll 
go chestnutting over by Mr. Jonathan Jones’s. 
I tell you it’s splendid climbing up. If you’re 


SHALL SHE COME? 


41 


very careful, you needn’t tear your dress very 
badly. Then there’s the raft, and you might 
play base-ball too. I’ll teach you. 

You see if you don’t have a nice time. I 
can’t think of anything more to say. 

Your affectionate cousin, 

Gypsy/ ^ 


CHAPTER III. 


ONE EVENING. 


it was settled, and Joy came. There 
was no especial day appointed for the 



journey. Her father was to come up 


T with her as soon as he had arranged his 
affairs so that he could do so, and then to go 
directly back to Boston and sail at once. 

Gypsy found plenty to do, in getting ready 
for her cousin. This having a room-mate for the 
first time in her life, was by no means an unim- 
portant event to her. Her room had always 
been her own especial private property. Here 
in a quiet nook on the broad window-sill, she 
had curled herself up for hours with her new 
story-books ; here she had locked herself in to 


42 


ONE EVENING. 


43 


learn her lessons, and keep her doll’s dress- 
making out of Winnie’s way ; here she had 
gone away alone to have all her ‘ ‘ good cries ; ” 
here she sometimes spent a part of her Sabbath 
evenings, with her most earnest and sober 
thoughts. 

Here was the mantel-shelf, covered with her 
little knick-knacks that no one was ever allowed 
to touch but herself, — pictures framed in pine- 
cones, boxes of shell-work, baskets of wafer- 
work, cologne-bottles, watch-cases, ivy-shoots 
and minerals, on which the dust accumulated at 
its own sweet will, and the characteristic variety 
and arrangement whereof none ever disputed 
with her, — what if J oy should bring a trunk- 
ful of ornaments? 

There in the wardrobe were her treasures 
covering six shelves ; her kites and balls of 
twine, fish-lines and doll’s bonnets, scraps of 
gay silk and jack-knives, old compositions and 
portfolios, colored paper and dried moss, pieces 


44 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


of chalk and horse-chestnuts, broken jewelry 
and marbles. It was a curious collection. 
One would suppose it to be a sort of copartner- 
ship between the property of a boy and girl, 
in which the boy decidedly predominated. 

Into this wardrobe Gypsy looked regretfully. 
Three of those shelves — those precious shelves 
must be Joy’s now. And what should be done 
with the things ? 

Then there were the bureau drawers. What 
sorcerer’s charms, to say nothing of the some- 
what unwilling fingers of a not very enthusiastic 
little girl, could cram the contents of four (and 
those so full that they were overflowing through 
the cracks,) into two? 

Moreover, as any one acquainted with certain 
chapters in Gypsy’s past history will remember, 
her premises were not always celebrated for the 
utmost tidiness. And here was Joy, used to 
her elegant carpets and marble-covered bureaus, 
and gas-fixtures and Cochituate, with servants to 


45 


ONJ^VENING. 


pick up her things for her ever since she was a 
baby. How shocked she would be at the dust, 
and the ubiquitous slippers, and the slips and 
shreds on the carpet ; and how should she have 
the least idea what it was to have to do things 
yourself? 

However, Gypsy put a brave face on it, and 
emptied the bureau drawers, and squeezed away 
the treasures into three shelves, and did her 
best to make the room look pleasant and in- 
viting to the little stranger. In fact, before 
she was through with the work, she became 
really very much interested in it. She had put 
a clean white quilt upon the bed, and looped up 
the curtain with a handsome crimson ribbon, 
taken from the stock in the wardrobe. She had 
swept and dusted every corner and crevice ; she 
had displayed all her ornaments to the best ad- 
vantage, and put fresh cologne in the bottles. 
She had even brought from some sanctum where 
it was folded away in the dark, a very choice 


46 


gypsy’s COUilN JOY. 


silk flag about four inches long, that she had 
made when the war began, and was keeping 
very tenderly to wear when Richmond was 
taken, and pinned it up over her looking-glass. 

On the table too, stood her Parian vase filled 
with golden and blood-red maple leaves, and 
the flaming berries of the burning-bush. 
Very prettily the room looked, when everything 
was finished, and Gypsy was quite proud of it. 

Joy came Thursday night. They were all 
in the parlor when the coach stopped, and 
Gypsy ran out to meet her. 

A pale, sickly, tired-looking child, draped 
from head to foot in black, came up the steps 
clinging to her father’s hand, and fretting over 
something or other about the baggage. 

Gypsy was springing forward to meet her, 
but stopped short. The last time she had seen 
Joy, she was in gay Stuart-plaid silk and 
corals. She had forgotten all about the mourn- 
ing. How thin and tall it made Joy look ! 


ONE EVENING. 


47 


Gypsy remembered herself in a minute, and 
threw her arms warmly around Joy’s neck. 
But Joy did not return the embrace, and gave her 
only one cold kiss. She had inferred from 
Gypsy’s momentary hesitation, that she was not 
glad to see her. 

Gypsy on her part, thought Joy was proud 
and disagreeable. Thus the two girls mis- 
understood each other at the very beginning. 

“ I’m real glad to see you,” said Gypsy. 

‘ ‘ I thought we never should get here ! ” said 
Joy, petulantly. “The cars were so dusty, 
and your coach jolts terribly. I shouldn’t think 
the town would use such an old thing.” 

Gypsy’s face fell, and her welcome grew 
faint. 

Joy had but little to say at supper. She sat 
by her father and ate her muffins like a very 
hungry, tired child, — like a very cross child, 
Gypsy thought. Joy’s face was always pale and 
fretful ; in the bright lamp-light now, after the 


48 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


exhaustion of the long journey, it had a 
pinched, unpleasant look. 

“ Hera,” coughed Tora, over his tea-cup. 
Gypsy looked up, and their eyes met. That 
look said unutterable things. 

If it had not been for Mrs. Breynton, that 
supper would have been a dismal affair. But 
she had such a cosey, comfortable way about 
her, that nobody could help being cosey and 
comfortable, if they tried hard for it. After a 
while, when Mr. Breynton and his brother had 
gone away into the library for a talk by them- 
selves, and Joy began to feel somewhat rested, 
she brightened up wonderfully, and became 
really quite entertaining in her account of her 
journey. She thought Vermont looked cold and 
stupid, however, and didn’t remember having 
noticed much about the mountains, for which 
Gypsy thought she should never forgive her. 

But there was at least one thing Gypsy found 
out that evening to like about Joy. She loved 


ONE EVENING. 


49 


her father dearly. One could not help noticing 
how restless she was while he was out of the 
room, and how she watched the door for him to 
come back ; how when he did come, she stole 
away from her aunt and sat down by him, 
slipping her hand softly into his. As he had 
been all her life, the most indulgent and patient 
of fathers, and was going early to-morrow 
morning thousands of miles away from her into 
thousands of unknown dangers, it was no 
wonder. 

While it was still quite early, Joy proposed 
going to bed. She was tired, and besides, she 
wanted to unpack a few of her things. So 
Gypsy, lighted the lamp and went up with 
her. 

“ So I am to sleep with you,” said Joy, as 
they opened the door, in by no means the hap- 
piest of tones, though they were polite enough. 

“Yes. Mother thought it was better, — 
see, isn’t my room pretty? ” said Gypsy, eager- 


4 


50 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


ly, thinking how pleased Joy would be with 
the little welcome of its fresh adornments. 

“ Oh, is this it? ” 

Gypsy stopped short, the hot color rushing 
all over her face. 

“ Of course it isn’t like yours. We can’t 
afford marble bureaus and Brussels carpets, but 
I thought you’d like the maple leaves, and I 
brought out the flag on purpose because you 
were coming.” 

‘‘Flag? where? Oh yes, I have one ten 
times as big as that at home,” said Joy, and 
then she too stopped short, for she saw the ex- 
pression of Gypsy’s face. Astonished and 
puzzled, wondering what she had done, Joy 
turned away to unpack, when her eye fell on 
the vase with its gorgeous leaves and berries, 
and she cried out in real delight, — 

“ O — oh, \iow pretty ! Why, we don’t have 
anything like this in Boston.” 

But Gypsy was only half comforted. 


ONE EVENING. 


51 


Joy unlocked her trunk then, and for a few 
minutes they chatted merrily over the unpack- 
ing. Where is the girl that doesn’t like to look 
at pretty clothes? and where is the girl that 
doesn’t like to show them if they happen to be 
her own ? Joy’s linen was all of the prettiest 
pattern, with wonderful trimmings and embroid- 
eries such as Gypsy had seldom seen ; her 
collars and undersleeves were of the latest 
fashion, and fluted with choice laces ; her tiny 
slippers were tufted with velvet bows, and of 
her nets and hair-ribbons, there was no end. 
Gypsy looked on without a single pang of envy, 
contrasting them with her own plain, neat 
things of course, but glad in Gypsy’s own 
generous fashion, that Joy had them. 

‘ ‘ I had pretty enough things when you were 
in Boston,” said Joy, unfolding her heavy black 
dresses with their plain folds of bombazine and 
crape. “Now I can’t wear anything but this 
ugly black. Tlien there are all my corals and 


52 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


malachites just good for nothing. Madame St. 
Denis — she’s the dressmaker — said I couldn’t 
wear a single thing but jet, and jet makes me 
look dreadfully brown.” 

Gypsy hung up the dress that was in her 
hand, and walked over to the window. She 
felt very much as if somebody had been drawing 
a file across her front teeth. 

She could not have explained what was the 
matter. Somehow she seemed to see a quick 
picture of her own mother dying and dead, and 
herself in the sad, dark dresses. And how 
J oy could speak so — how she could ! 

‘ ‘ Oh — only two bureau drawers ! Why 
didn’t you give me the two upper ones ? ” said 
Joy, presently, when she was ready to put away 
her collars and boxes. 

‘ ‘ Because my things were in there,” said 
Gypsy. 

‘‘ But your things were in the lower ones just 
as much.” 


ONE EVENING. 


55 


“ I like the upper drawers best,” said Gypsy, 
shortly. 

“ So do I,” retorted Joy. 

The hot color rushed over Gypsy’s face for 
the second time, 6ut now it was a somewhat 
angry color. 

It wasn’t very pleasant to have to give up 
any, and there are all those wardrobe shelves I 
had to take my things off from too, and I don’t 
think you’ve any right to make a fuss.” 

“That’s polite!” said Joy, with a laugh. 
Gypsy knew it wasn’t, but for that very reason 
she wouldn’t say so. 

One more subject of dispute came up almost 
before this was forgotten. When they were all 
ready to go to bed, Joy wanted the front side. 

“ But that’s where I always sleep,” said 
Gypsy. 

“ There isn’t any air over the back side, and 
I can’t breathe,” said Joy. 

“ Neither can I,” said Gypsy. 


54 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ I never can get to sleep if I don’t have the 
place I’m used to,” said Joy. 

“ You can just as well as I can,” said Gypsy. 
“ Besides, it’s my bed.” 

This last argument appeared to be unanswer- 
able, and Gypsy had it her way. 

She thought it over before she went to sleep, 
which was not very soon ; for Joy was restless, 
and tossed on her pillow, and talked in her 
dreams. Of course the front side and the upper 
drawers belonged to her, — yes, of course. She 
had only taken her rights.. She would be 
obliged to anybody to show her where she was 
to blame. 

Joy went to sleep without any thoughts, and 
therein lay just the difference. 


CHAPTER IV. 


CHESTNUTS. 

^^^^OMETHING woke Gypsy very early the 
next morning. She started up, and saw 

¥ Joy standing by the bed, in the faint, 
gray light, all dressed, and shivering 
with the cold. 

“Well, I never ! ” said Gypsy. 

“ What’s the matter? ” 

“ What on earth have you got your dress on 
in the middle of the night for ? ” 

“ It isn’t night ; it’s morning.” 

“ Morning ! it isn’t any such a thing.” 
“’Tis, too. I heard the clock strike five 
ever so long ago.” 

Gypsy had fallen back on the pillow, almost 
( 65 ) 


56 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


asleep again. She roused herself with a little 
jump. 

‘ ‘ See here / ” 

“ Ow I how you frightened me,” said Joy, 
with another jump. 

“Did I? Oh, well” — silence. “I don’t 
see ” — another silence — ‘ ‘ what you wear my 
rubber — rubber-boots for.” 

“ Your rubber-boots ! Gypsy Breynton, 
you’re sound asleep.” 

“Asleep!” said Gypsy, sitting up with a 
jerk, and rubbing both fists into her eyes, “ I’m 
just as wide awake as you are. Oh, why, 
you’re dressed ! ” 

“ Just found that out!” Joy broke into a 
laugh, and Gypsy, now quite awake, joined in 
it merrily. For the first time a vague notion 
came to her that she was rather glad Joy came. 
It might be some fun, after all, to have some- 
body a-ound all the time to — in that untrans- 
latable girls’ phrase — “ carry on with.” 


CHESTNUTS. 


57 


“But I don’t see what’s up,” said Gypsy, 
winking and blinking like an owl, to keep her 
eyes open. 

“ Why, I was afraid father’d get off before I 
was awake, so I was determined he shouldn’t. 
I guess I kept waking up pretty much all night 
to see if it wasn’t time.” 

“ I wish he didn’t have to go,” said Gypsy. 
She felt sorry for Joy just then, seeing this best 
side of her that she liked. For about a minute 
she wished she had let her have the upper 
drawer. 

Joy’s fa,ther started by a very early train, and 
it was still hardly light when he sat down to his 
hurried breakfast, with Joy close by him, that 
pale, pinched look on her face, and so utterly 
silent that Gypsy was astonished. She would 
have thought she cared nothing about her fa- 
ther’s going, if she had not seen her standing 
in the gray light up-stairs. 

“Joyce, my child, you haven’t eaten a 
mouthful,” said her father. 


58 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“IcanV’ 

“ Come, dear, do, just a little, to please 
father.” 

Joj put a spoonful of tea to her lips, and put 
it down. Presently there was a great rumbling 
of wheels outside, and the coachman rang the 
door-bell. 

“ Well, Joy.” 

Joy stood up, but did not speak. Her 
father, holding her close in his arms, drew her 
out with him into the entry. Mrs. Breynton 
turned away ; so did Gypsy and the rest. In a 
minute they heard Joy go into the parlor and 
shut the door, and then her father called out to 
them with his cheerful good-byes, and then he 
was in the coach, and the door was shut. 

Gypsy stole into the parlor. Joy was stand- 
ing there alone by the window. 

‘ ‘ Why don’t you cry ? ” said Gypsy ; “I 
would.” 

“ I don’t want to,” said Joy, moving away. 


CHESTNUTS. 


59 


Her sorrow at parting with her father made her 
fretful that morning. This was Joy’s way. She 
had inherited her mother’s fashion of taking 
trouble. Gypsy did not understand it, and her 
sympathy cooled a little. Still she really 
wanted to do something to make her happy, and 
so she set about it in the only ways she knew. 

“ See here, Joy, she called, merrily, after 
breakfast, “ let’s come out and have a good 
time. I have lots and lots to show you out in 
the barn and round. Then there is' all York- 
bury besides, and the mountains. Which’ll you 
do first, see the chickens or walk out on the 
ridge-pole ? ” 

“ On the tt’to ” 

‘ ‘ On the ridge-pole ; that’s the top of the 
roof, you know, over the kitchen. Tom and I 
go out there ever so much.” 

“ Oh, I’d rather see the chickens. I should 
think you’d kill you, walking on roofs. Wait 
till I get my gloves.” 


60 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“Oh, you don’t want gloves in Yorlchiiry,^ 
said Gypsy, with a very superior air. “ That’s 
nothing but a Boston fashion. Slip on your 
hat and sack in a jiff, and come along.” 

“ I shall tan my hands,” said Joy, reluc- 
tantly, as they went out. “Besides, I .don’t 
know what a jiff is.” 

“ A jiff is, — why, it’s short for jiffy, I sup- 
pose.” 

“ But what’s a jiffy? ” persisted Joy. 

“ Couldn’t tell you,” said Gypsy, with a 
bubbling laugh ; “ I guess it’s something that’s 
in a terrible hurry. Tom says it ever so 
much.” 

‘ ‘ I shouldn’t think your mother would let 
you use boys’ talk,” said Joy. Gypsy some- 
times stood in need of some such hint as this, 
but she did not relish it from Joy. By way of 
reply she climbed up the post of the clothes- 
line. 

Joy thought the chickens were pretty, but 


CHESTNUTS. 


61 


they had such long legs, and such a silly way 
of squealing when you took them up, as if you 
were going to murder them. Besides she was 
afraid she should step on them. So they went 
into the barn, and Gypsy exhibited Billy and 
Bess and Clover with the talent of a Barnum 
and the pride of a queen. Billy was the old 
horse who had pulled the family to church 
through the sand every Sunday since the chil- 
dren were babies, and Bess and Clover were 
white-starred, gentle-eyed cows, who let Gypsy 
pull their horns and tickle them with hay, and 
make pencil-marks on their white foreheads to 
her heart’s content, and looked at Joy’s strange 
lace with great musing beautiful brown eyes. 
But Joy was afraid they would hook her, and 
she didn’t like to be in a barn. 

“ What ! not to tumble on the hay ! ” cried 
Gypsy, half way up the ladder into the loft ; 
“just see what a quantity there is of it. Did 
you ever know such a quantity? Father lets 


62 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


me jump on it ’cause I dont hurt the hay — very 
much.” 

No, Joy couldn’t possibly climb up the ladder. 
Well, Gypsy would help her then. By a little 
manoeuvring, she persuaded Joy to step up 
three rounds, and she herself stood behind her 
and began to walk up. Joy screamed and 
stood still. 

‘ ‘ Go ahead ; you can’t stop now. I’ll keep 
hold of you,” said Gypsy, choking with laugh 
ter, and walking on. There was nothing for 
Joy to do but climb, unless she chose to be 
walked over, so up they went, she steaming 
and Gypsy pushing all the way. 

“Now all you have to do is just to get up on 
the beams and jump olF,” said Gypsy, up there, 
and peering down from among the cobwebs, and 
flying through the air, almost before the words 
were off from her lips. But Joy wouldn’t hear 
of getting into such a dusty place. She took 
two or three dainty little rolls on the hay, but 


CHESTNUTS. 


63 


the dried clover got into her hair and mouth and 
eyes, and she was perfectly sure there was a 
spider down her neck ; so Gypsy was glad at 
last to get her safely down the ladder and out 
doors. 

After that they tried the raft. Gypsy’s raft 
was on a swamp below the orchard, and it was 
one of her favorite amusements to push herself 
about over the shallow water. But Joy was 
afraid of wetting her feet, or getting drowned, 
or something, — she didn’t exactly know what, 
so they gave that up. 

Then Gypsy proposed a game of marbles on 
the garden path. She played a great deal with 
Tom, and played well. But Joy was shocked 
at the idea. That was a ho]fs play ! 

“ What will you do, then?” said Gypsy, a 
little crossly. Joy replied in the tone of a 
martyr, that she was sure she did not know. 
Gypsy coughed, and walked up and down on 
the garden fence in significant silence. 


64 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Joy was not to go to school till Monday. 
Meantime she amused herself at home with her 
aunt, and Gypsy went as usual without her. 

Saturday afternoon was the perfect pattern 
of an autumn afternoon. A creamy haze 
softened the sharp outline of the mountains, 
and lay cloudlike on the fields. The sunlight 
fell through it like sifted gold ; the sky hung 
motionless and blue, — that glowless, deepening 
blue that always made Gypsy feel, she said, 
“ as if she must drink it right up,” — and away 
over miles of field and mountain slope the 
maples crimsoned and flamed. 

Gypsy came home at noon with her hat hang- 
ing down her neck, her cheeks on fire, and 
panting like the old lady who died for want of 
breath ; rushing up the steps, tearing open the 
door, and slamming into the parlor. 

“ Look here ! — everybody — where are you ? 
What do you think ? Joy ! Mother I There’s 
going to be a great chestnutting.” 


CHESTNUTS. 


65 


“A what?” asked Joy, dropping her em- 
broidery. 

“ A chestnutting, up at Mr. Jonathan Jones’s 
trees, this afternoon at two o’clock. Did you 
ever hear anything so perfectly mag ? ” — mag 
being ‘ ‘ Gypsy ” for magnificent. 

“Who are to make the party?” asked her 
mother. 

“ Oh, I and Sarah Eowe and Delia Guest 
and — and Sarah Rowe and I,” said Gypsy, 
talking very fast. 

“ And Joy,” said Mrs. Breynton, gently. 

“ Joy, of course. That’s what I came in to 
say.” 

“ Oh, I don’t care to go if you don’t want 
me,” said Joy, with a slighted look. 

“ But I do want you. Who said I didn’t? ” 

“Well,” said Joy, somewhat mollified, .“ I’ll 
go if there aren’t any spiders.” 

The two girls equipped themselves with tin 
pails, thick * boots, and a lunch-basket, and 


6 


66 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


started off in high spirits at precisely half past 
one. Joy had a remarkably vague idea of 
what she was going to do, but she felt unusually 
good-natured, as who could help feeling, with 
such a sunlight as that, and such distant glories 
of the maple-trees, and such shadows melting 
on the mountains ? 

“I want to go chestnotting, too-o-o I ” 
called Winnie, disconsolate, in the doorway. 

“No, Winnie, you couldn’t, possibly,” said 
Gypsy, pleasantly, sorry to disappoint him ; but 
she was quite too well acquainted with Winnie 
to undertake a nutting party in his company. 

“Oh, yes, do let’s take him ; he’s so cun- 
ning,” said Joy. Joy was totally unused to 
children, having never had brothers and sisters 
of her own, and since she had been there, 
Winnie had not happened to develop in any of 
his characteristic methods. Moreover, he had 
speedily discovered that Joy laughed at every- 
thing he said ; even his most ordinary efforts in 


CHESTNUTS. 


67 


the line of wit ; and that she gave him lumps 
of sugar when she thought of it ; and therefore 
he had been on his best behavior whenever she 
W'as about. 

“He’s so terribly cunning,” repeated Joy, 
“ I guess he won’t do any hurt.” 

“I won’t do any hurt*,” put in Winnie; 
“ I’m real cunnin’, Gypsy.” 

“You may do as you like, of course,” said 
Gypsy. “ I know he will make trouble and 
spoil all the party, and the girls would scold me 
’cause I brought him. I’ve tried it times 
enough. If you’re a mind to take care of him, 
I suppose you can, but you see if you don’t 
repent your bargain.” 

Gypsy was perfectly right ; she was not apt 
to be selfish in her treatment of Winnie. Such 
a tramp as this was not at all suited to his capac- 
ities of feet or temper, and if his mother had 
been there she would have managed to make 
him happy in staying at home. But Winnie 


68 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


had received quite too much encouragement; 
he had no thought of giving up his bargain 
now. 

“ Gypsy Breynton, you just needn’t talk. 
I’m goin’ chestnotting. I’m five years old. 
I’m goin’ with cousin Joy, and I’ll eat just as 
many chestnots as you or anybody else, now ! ” 

Gypsy had not the slightest doubt of that, 
and the three started oflp together. 

They met Sarah Rowe and Delia on the way, 
and Gypsy introduced them. 

“ This is my cousin Joy, and tliis is Sarah. 
That one in the shaker bonnet is Delia Guest. 
Oh, I forgot. Joy’s last name is Breynton, 
and Sarah is Sarah Rowe.” 

Joy bowed in her prim, cityish way*, and 
Sarah and Delia were so much astonished 
thereat that they forgot to bow at all, and Delia 
stared rudely at her black dress. There was an 
awkward silence. 

“Why don’t you talk, somebody?” broke 


CHESTNUTS. 


69 


out Gypsy, getting desperate. “ Anybody’d 
think we were three mummies in a museum.” 

“ I don’t think you’re very perlite,” put in 
WiTinie, with a virtuous frown ; “if you don’t 
let me be a dummy, too. I’ll tell mother, and 
that would make four.” 

This broke the ice, and Sarah and Delia 
begali to talk very fast about Monday’s grammar 
lesson, and Miss Cardrew, and how Agnes 
Gaylord put a green snake in Phoebe Hunt’s 
lunch-basket, and had to stay after school for it, 
and how it was confidently reported in mysteri- 
ous whispers, at recess, that George Castles told 
Mr. Guernsey he was a regular old fogy, and 
Mr. Guernsey had sent home a letter to his 
father, — not Mr. Guernsey’s father, but 
George’s ; he had now, true’s you live. 

Now to Joy, of course, none of this was 
very interesting, for she had not been into the 
schoolroom yet, and didn’t know George Castles 
and Agnes Gaylord from Adnm ; and somehow 


70 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


or other it never occurred to Gypsy to intro- 
duce some subject in which they could all take 
part ; and so somehow it came about that J oy 
fell behind with Winnie, and the three girls 
went on together all the way to Mr. Jones’s 
grove. 

‘ ‘ Isn’t it splendid ? ” called Gypsy, turning 
around. “I’m having a real nice time.” 

“ Ye — es,” said Joy, dolefully; “I guess I 
shall like it better when we get to the chest- 
nuts.” 

Nothing particular happened on the way, 
except that when they were crossing INIr. Jon- 
athan’s ploughed field, Winnie stuck in the 
mud tight, and when he was pulled out he left 
his shoes behind him ; that he repeated this 
pleasing little incident six consecutive times 
within five minutes, varying it by lifting up his 
voice to weep, in Winnie’s own accomplished 
style ; and that J oy ended by carrying him in 
her arms the whole way. 


CHESTNUTS. 


71 


Be it here recorded that Joy^s ideal of “ cher- 
ubic childhood,” Winnie standing as representa- 
tive cherub, underwent then and there several 
modifications. 

‘ ‘ Here we are I ” cried Gypsy at last, clear- 
ing a low fence with a bound. “ Just see the 
leaves and the sky. Isn’t it just — oh I ” 

It was, indeed “just,” and there it stopped; 
there didn’t seem to be any more words to say 
about it. The chestnut-trees were clustered on 
a small, rocky knoll, their golden-brown leaves 
fluttering in the sunlight, their great, rich, 
bursting green burs bending down the boughs, 
and dropping to the ground. Around them and 
among them a belt of maples stood up like 
blazing torches sharp against the sky, — yellow, 
scarlet, russet, maroon, and crimson veined 
with blood, all netted and laced together, and 
floating down upon the wind like shattered jew- 
els. Beyond, the purple mountains, and the 
creamy haze, and the silent sky. 


72 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


It was a sight to make younger and older 
than these four girls, stand still with deepening 
eyes. For about a half-minute nobody spoke, 
and I venture to say the four different kinds of 
thoughts they had just then, would make a 
pretty bit of a poem. 

Whatever they were, a fearfully unromantic 
and utterly indescribable howl from Winnie, 
put an unceremonious end to them. 

“ 0-oh ! ugh! ah! Gypsy! Joy! I’ve got 
catched onto my buttons. My head’s tippin’ 
over the wrong way. Boo-hoo-hoo ! Gypsy ! ” 

The girls turned, and stood transfixed, and 
screamed till they lost their breath, and laughed 
till they cried. 

Winnie, not being of a sentimental turn of 
mind, had regarded unmoved the flaming glories 
of the maple-leaves, and being influenced by 
the more earthly attractions of the chestnuts, 
had conceived the idea of seizing advantage of 
the girls’ unpractical rapture to be the first on 



Winnie caught in the Fence, page 73 . 



CHESTNUTS. 


73 


the field, and take entire and lawful possession 
thereof. Therefore had he made all manner of 
haste to crawl through the fence, and there had 
he stuck fast between two bars, balanced like a 
see-saw, his head going up and his feet going 
down, his feet going up and his head going 
down. 

Gypsy pulled him out as well as she could 
between her spasms of laughter. 

“I don’t see anythin’ to laugh at,” said 
Winnie, severely. “ If you don’t stop laughin’ 
I’ll go tvay ofip into the woods and be a Injun 
and never come home any more, and build me a 
house with a chimney to it, ’n have baked beans 
for supper ’n lots of chestnots, and a gun and a 
pistol, and I won’t give you any ! Goin’ to stop 
laughin’ ? ” 

It did not take long to pick up the nuts that 
the wind and the frost had already strewn upon 
the ground, and everybody enjoyed it but Joy. 
She pricked her unaccustomed fingers on the 


74 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


sharp burs, and didn’t like the nuts when she 
had tasted of them. 

“ They’re not the kind of chestnuts we have 
in Boston,” she said ; “ ours are soft like pota- 
tatoes.” 

“Oh dear, oh dear, she thought they grew 
boiled and there was a great laugh. Joy 
colored, and did not relish it very much. Gyp- 
sy was too busy pulling off her burs to notice 
this. Presently the ground was quite cleared. 

“ Now we must climb,” said Gypsy. Gypsy 
was always the leader in their plays ; always 
made all their plans. Sarah Rowe was her 
particular friend, and thought everything Gypsy 
did about right, and seldom opposed her. Delia 
never opposed anybody. 

“ Oh, I don’t know how to climb,” said Joy, 
shrinking and shocked. 

“But I’ll show you. This isn’t anything; 
these branches are just as low as they can be. 
Here, I’ll go first and help you, and Sarah can 


come next.’ 


CHESTNUTS. 


75 


So up went Gypsy, nimble as a squirrel, over 
the low-hanging boughs that swayed with her 
weight. 

“ Come, Joy ! I can’t wait.” 

Joy trembled and screamed and came. She 
crawled a little ways up the lowest of the 
branches, and stopped, frightened by the 
motion. 

“ Catch hold of the upper bough and stand 
up. Then you can walk it,” called Gypsy, half 
out of sight now among the thick leaves. 

Joy did as she was told, — her feet slipped, 
the lower branch swung away from under her, 
and there she hung by both hands in mid-air. 
She was not more than four feet from the 
ground, and could have jumped down without 
the slightest difficulty, but that she was alto- 
gether too frightened to do. So she swung 
back and forth like a lantern, screaming as loud 
as she could scream. 

Gypsy was peculiarly sensitive to anything 


76 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


funny, and she quite forgot that Joy was 
really frightened ; indeed, used as she was to 
the science of tree-climbing all her life, that a 
girl could hang within four feet of the ground, 
and not know enough to jump, seemed to her 
perfectly incomprehensible. 

“Jump, Joy, jump!” she called, between 
her shouts of laughter. 

“ No, no, don’t, you might break your arm,” 
cried Delia Guest, who hadn’t the slightest 
scruple about telling a falsehood if she were 
going to have something to laugh at by the 
means. Poor Joy was between Scylla and 
Chary bdis. (If you don’t know what that 
means, go and ask your big brothers ; make 
them leave their chess and their newspapers on 
the spot, and read you what Mr. Virgil has to 
say about it.) If she hung on, she would 
wrench her arms ; if she jumped, she should 
break them. She hung screaming, as long as 
she could, and dropped when she could hang no 


CHESTNUTS. 


77 


longer, looking about in an astonishment that 
was irresistibly funny, at finding herself alive 
and unhurt on the soft moss. 

The girls were still laughing too hard to talk. 
Joy stood up with a very red face, and began to 
walk slowly away without a word. 

“ Where are you going? ” called Gypsy from 
the branches. 

“ Home,” said Joy. 

“Oh, don’t; come, we wont laugh any 
more. Come back, and you needn’t climb. 
You can stay underneath and pick up while we 
throw down.” 

“No; I’ve had enough of it. I don’t like 
chestnutting, and I don’t like to be laughed at, 
either. Ilphant stay any longer.” 

“ I’m real sorry,” said Gypsy. “ I couldn’t 
help laughing at you, you did look so terribly 
funny. Oh, dear, you ought to have seen 
yourself! I wish you wouldn’t go. If you 
do, you can find the way alone, I suppose.” 

“I suppose so,” said Joy, doubtfully. 


78 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“Well, you’d better take Winnie ; you know 
you brought him, and I can’t keep him here. 
It would spoil everything. Why, where is the 
chUd?” 

He was nowhere to be seen. 

“ Winnie ! Win — nie I ” 

There was a great splash somewhere, and a 
curious bubbling sound, but where it came from 
nobody could tell. All at once Delia broke 
into something between a laugh and a scream. 

“ O — oh, I see I Look there — down in that 
ditch beyond the elder-bushes — quick ! ” 

Rising up into the air out of the muddy 
ground, without any visible support whatever, 
were a pair of feet, — Winnie’s feet, unmistak- 
ably, because of their copper toes ^d tagless 
shoe-strings, — and kicking frantically back and 
forth. “ Only that and nothing more.” 

“Why, where’s the — rest of him?” said 
Joy, blankly. At this instant Gypsy darted 
past her with a sudden movement, flew down 


CHESTNUTS. 


79 


therknoll, and began to pull at the mysterious 
feet as if for dear life. 

“Why, what is she doing?” cried all the 
girls in a breath. As they spoke, up came 
Winnie entire into the air, head down, dripping, 
drenched, black with mud, gasping, nearly 
drowned. 

Gypsy shook him and pounded him on the 
back till his breath came, and when she found 
there was no harm done, she set him down on a 
stone, wiped the mud oif from his face, and 
threw herself down on the grass as if she 
couldn’t stand up another minute. 

“Crying? Why, no ; she’s laughing. Did 
you ever ? ” 

And down ran the girls to see what was the 
matter. At the foot of the knoll was a ditch 
of black mud. In the middle of this ditch was 
a round hole two feet deep, which had been dug 
at some time to collect water for the cattle pas- 
turing in the field to drink. Into this hole, 


80 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Winnie, in the course of some scientific inves- 
tigations as to the depth of the water, had 
fallen, unfortunately, the wrong end foremost, 
and there he certainly would have drowned, if 
Gypsy had not seen him just when she did. 

But he was not drowned ; on the contrary, 
except for the mud, “as good as new;” and 
what might have been a tragedy, and a very sad 
one, had become as Gypsy said, “ too funny 
for anything.” Winnie, however, “ didn’t see 
it,” and began to cry lustily to go home. 

“It’s fortunate you were just going,” said 
Gypsy. “I’ll just fill my pail, and then I’ll 
come along and very likely overtake you.” 

Probably Joy didn’t fancy this arrangement 
any too well, but she remembered that it was 
her own plan to take the child ; therefore she 
said nothing, and she and Winnie started off 
forlornly enough. 

About five o’clock Gypsy walked slowly up 
the yard, with her pail full of nuts, her hat in 


CHESTNUTS. 


81 


her hand, and a gay wreath of maple-leaves on 
her head. With her bright cheeks and twink- 
ling eyes, and the broad leaves casting their 
gorgeous shadows of crimson and gold upon her 
forehead, she made a pretty picture, — almost 
too pretty to scold. 

Tom met her at the door. Tom was very 
proud of Gypsy, and you could see in his eyes 
just then, what he thought of her. 

“ What a little” — he began, all ready for a 
frolic, and stopped, and grew suddenly grave. 

“ Where are Joy and Winnie? ” 

‘ ‘ Haven’t they come ? ” 

‘‘No.” 


6 


CHAPTER V. 

GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 

t YPSY turned very pale. 

“ Where are they ? ” persisted Tom. 
And just then her mother came out 
from the parlor. 

“ Why, Gypsy, where are the children?” 

“ I’m afraid Joy didn’t know the way,” said 
Gypsy, slowly. 

“ Did you let her come home alone? ” 

“ Yes’m. She was tired of the chestnuts, 
and Winnie fell into the ditch. Oh, mother ! ” 
Mrs. Breynton did not say one word. She 
tegan to put on her things very fast, and Tom 
hurried up to the store for his father. 


82 


GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 


83 


They hunted everywhere, through the fields 
and in the village ; they inquired of every shop- 
keeper and every passer, but no one had seen a 
girl in black, with a little boy. There were 
plenty of girls and an abundance of little boys 
to be found at a great variety of places, but 
most of the girls wore green-checked dresses, 
and the boys were in ragged jackets. Gypsy 
retraced every step of the way carefully from 
the roadside to the chestnut- trees. Mr. Jona- 
than Jones, delighted that he had actually 
caught somebody on his ploughed land, came 
running down with a terrible scolding on his 
lips. But when he saw Gypsy’s utterly wretched 
face and heard her story, he helped her instead, 
to search the chestnut grove and the surround- 
ino: fields all over. But there was not a flutter 
of Joy’s black dress, not an echo of Winnie’s 
cry. The sunset was fading fast in the west, 
long shadows were slanting down the valley, 
and the blaze of the maples was growing faint. 


84 


gypsy's cousin joy. 


On the mountains it was quite blotted out by 
the gathering darkness. 

‘‘WhatsM/ I do?” cried Gypsy, thinking 
with a great sinking at her heart, how cold the 
nights were now, and how early it grew quite 
dark. 

“ Hev you been 'long that ere cross-road ’t 
opens aout through the woods onto the three- 
mile square ? ” asked Mr. J onathan . ‘ ‘ I’ve been 
a thinkin’ on’j; as heow the young uns might ha 
took that ere ef they was flustered 'beout know- 
in’ the way neow mos’ likely.” 

“ Oh, what a splendid, good man you are ! ” 
said Gypsy, jumping up and down, and clap- 
ping her hands with delight. “ ^Nobody 
thought, of that, and I’ll never run over your 
ploughed-up land again as long as ever I live, 
and I’m going right to tell father, and you see 
if I do ! ” 

Her father wondered that they had not thought 
of it, and old Billy was harnessed in a hurry, 


GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 


85 


and they started for the three-mile cross-road. 
Gypsy went with them. Nobody spoke to her 
except to ask questions now and then as to the 
precise direction the children took, and the 
time they started for home. Gypsy leaned 
back in the carriage, peering out into the gloom 
on either side, calling Joy’s name now and then, 
or Winnie’s, and busy with her own wretched 
thoughts. Whatever they were, she did not 
very soon forget them. 

It was very dark now, and very cold ; the 
crisp frost glistened on the grass, and an ugly- 
looking red moon peered over the mountain. 
It seemed to Gypsy like a great, glaring eye, 
that was singling her out and following her, 
and asking, “Where are Joy and Winnie?” 
over and over. “ Gypsy Breynton, Gypsy 
Breynton, where are Joy and Winnie?” She 
turned around with her back to it, so as not to 
see it. 

Once they passed an old woman on the road. 


86 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


hobbling along with a stick. Mr, Breynton 
reined up and asked if she had seen anything 
of two children. 

“ Haow? ” said the old woman. 

“ Have you seen anything of two children 
along here ? ” 

“Chilblains? No, I don’t have none this 
time o’ year, an’ I don’t know what business it 
is o’ yourn, nuther.” 

“ Children ! ” shouted IMr. Breynton ; “ two 
children, a boy and a girl.” 

“ Speak a little louder, can’t you? I’m 
deef,” said the old woman. 

‘ ‘ Have you — seen anything — of — two — 
children — a little boy, and a girl in black? ” 

‘ ‘ Chickens ? black chickens ? ” said the old 
woman, with an angry shake of the head ; “no, 
I haint got no chickens for yer. My pullet’s 
white, and I set a heap on’t, an’ wouldn’t sell it 
to nobody as come askin’ oncivil questions of a 
lone, lorn widdy. Besides, the cat eat it up 
las’ week, feathers ’n all.” 


GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 


87 


Mr. Breynton concluded there was not much 
information to be had in that quarter, and drove 
on. 

A little way farther they came across a small 
boy turning somersets in the ditch. Mr. 
Breynton stopped again and repeated his ques- 
tions. 

“ How many of ’em? ” asked the boy with a 
thoughtful look. 

“ Two, a boy and a girl.” 

“Two?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ A boy and a girl?” 

“Yes.” 

“You said one was a boy and t’other was a 
girl,” repeated the small boy, looking very 
bright. 

“Yes. The boy was quite small, and the 
gu'l wore ajblack dress. They’re lost, and we’re 
trying to find them.” 

“ Be you, now, really ! ” said the small boy. 


88 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


apparently struck with sudden and overwhelm- 
ing admiration. ‘ ‘ That is terrible good in you. 
Seems to me now I reckon I see two young uns 
’long here somewhars, didn’t I? Le’ me see.” 

“ Oh, where, where?” cried Gypsy. “ Oh, 
I’m so glad ! Did the little boy have on a plaid 
jacket and brown coat ? ” 

“Waall, now, seems as ef ’twas somethin’ 
like that.” 

“ And the girl wore a hat and a long veil?” 
pursued Gypsy, eagerly. 

“Was she about the height of this gud here, 
and whereabouts did you see her?” asked Tom. 

“Waal, couldn’t tell exactly; somewhars 
between here an’ the village, I reckon. Seems 
to me she did have a veil or suthin’.” 

“And she was real pale?” cried Gypsy, 
“ and the boy was dreadfully muddy? ” 

“ Couldn’t say as to that,” — the small boy 
began to hesitate and look very wise ; — “ don’t 
seem to remember the mud, and on the whole. 


GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 


89 


I aint partiklar sure ’bout the veil. Oh, come 
to tliink on’t, it wasn’t a gal ; it was a cleef old 
woman, an’ there war n’t no boy noways.” 

Well was it for the small boy that, as the 
carriage rattled on, he took good care to be out 
of the reach of Tom’s whip-lash. 

It grew darker and colder, and the red moon 
rode on silently in the sky. They had come 
now to the opening of the cross-road, but there 
were no signs of the children, — only the still 
road and the shadows under the trees. 

“Hark! what’s that?” said Mr. Breynton, 
suddenly. He stopped the carriage, and they 
all listened. A faint, sobbing sound broke the 
silence. Gypsy leaned over the side of the 
carriage, peering in among the trees where the 
shadow was blackest. 

“Father, may I get out a minute?” 

She sprang over the wheel, ran into the 
cross-road, into a clump of bushes, pushed them 
aside — screamed for joy. 


90 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“Here they are, here they are — quick, 
quick ! Oh, Winnie Breynton, do just wake 
up and let me look at you ! Oh, Joy, I am so 
glad ! ” 

And there on the ground, true enough, sat 
Joy, exhausted and frightened and sobbing, 
with Winnie sound asleep in her lap. 

“I didn’t know the way, and Winnie kept 
telling me wrong, and, oh, I was so tired, and 
I sat down to rest, and it is so dark, and — and 
oh, I thought nobody ’d ever come I ” 

And poor Joy sprang into her uncle’s arms, 
and cried as hard as she could cry. 

Joy was thoroughly tired and chilled; it 
seemed that she had had to carry Winnie in her 
arms a large part of the way, and the child was 
by no means a light weight. Evidently, Master 
Winnie had taken matters pretty comfortably 
throughout, having had, Joy said, the utmost 
confidence in his own piloting, declaring “it 
was just the next house, right around the corner. 


GYPSY MAKES A BTSCOVERY. 


91 


Joy; how stupid in her not to know I — he 
knew all the whole of it just as well as any- 
thing,” and was none the worse for the adven- 
ture. Gypsy tried to wake him up, but he 
doubled up both fists in his dream, and greeted 
her with the characteristic reply — “ Naughty ! ” 
and that was all that was to be had from him. 
So he was rolled up warmly on the carriage 
floor ; they drove home as fast as Billy would 
go, and the two children, after a hot supper and 
a great many kisses, were put snugly to bed. 

After Joy was asleep, Mrs. Bre3mton said she 
would like to see Gypsy a few moments down 
stairs. 

“Yes’m,” said Gypsy, and came slowly 
down. They sat down in the dining-room 
alone. IVIrs. Breynton drew up her rocking- 
chair by the fire, and Gypsy took the cricket. 

There was a silence. Gypsy had an uncom- 
fortable feeling that her mother was waiting for 
her to speak first. She kicked off her slipper, 


92 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


and put it on; she rattled the tongs, and 
pounded the hearth with the poker ; she 
smoothed her hair out of her eyes, and folded 
up her handkerchief six times ; she looked up 
sideways at her mother; then she began to 
cough. At last she broke out — 

“ I suppose you want me to say Pm sorry. 
Well, I am. But I don’t see why I’m to blame. 
I’m sure.” 

“ I haven’t said you were to blame,” said her 
mother, quietly, “You know I have had no 
time yet to hear what happened this afternoon, 
and I thought you would like to tell me.” 

“ Well,” said Gypsy, “ I’d just as lief ; ” and 
Gypsy looked a little, a very little, as if she 
hadn’t just as lief at all. “You see, ‘in the 
first place and commencing,’ as Winnie says, 
Joy wanted to take him. Now she doesn’t know 
anything about that child, not a thing, and if 
she’d taken him to places as much as I have, 
and had to lug him home screaming all the way. 


GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 


93 


I guess she would have stopped wanting to, 
pretty quick, and I always take Winnie when I 
can, you know now, mother; and then Joy 
wouldn’t talk going over, either.” 

“Whom did she walk with?” interrupted 
Mrs. Breynton. 

“Why, with Winnie, I believe. Of course 
she might have come on with Sarah and Delia 
and me if she’d wanted to, but — I don’t 
know — ” 

“ Very well,” said Mrs. Bre3aiton, “ go on.” 

“Then, you see, Joy didn’t like chestnuts, 
and couldn’t climb, and — oh, Winnie kept 
losing his shoes, and got stuck in the fence, and 
you never saw anything so funny ! And then 
Joy couldn’t chmb, and she just hung there 
swinging, and now, mother, I couldn’t help 
laughing to save me, it was so exactly like a great 
pendulum with hoops on. Well, Joy was mad 
’cause we laughed and all, and so she said she’d 
go home. Then, — let me see, — oh, it was 


94 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


after that*, Winnie tumbled into the ditch, splash 
in ! with his feet up in the air, and I thought I 
^should go off to see him.” 

‘ ‘ But what about Joy ? ” 

“Oh, well Joy took Winnie, — he was so 
funny and muddy, you don’t Imow, — ’cause she 
brought him, you know, and so they came home, 
and I thought she knew the way as much as 
could be, and I guess that’s all.” 

“ Well, said her mother, after a pause, 
‘ ‘ what do you think about it ? ” 

“About what?” 

“Do you think you have done just right, 
Gypsy?” 

“ I don’t see why not,” said Gypsy, uneasily. 
“ It was perfectly fair Joy should take Winnie, 
and of course I wasn’t bound to give up my 
nutting party and come home, just for her.” 

“I’m not speaking of what is fair, Gypsy. 
Strictly speaking, Joy had her rights, and you 
had yours, and the arrangement might have 


GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 


95 


been called fair enough. But what’ do you 
think honestly, Gypsy, — were you a little sel- 
fish?” 

Gypsy opened her eyes wide. Honestly she 
might have said she didn’t know. She was by 
nature a generous child, and the charge of sel- 
fishness was seldom brought against her. 
Plenty of faults she had, but they were faults 
of quick-temper and carelessness. Of deliber- 
ate selfishness it had scarcely ever occurred to 
her that anybody could think her capable. So 
she echoed — 

“ Selfish ! ” in simple surprise. 

“ Just look at it,” said her mother, gently, 
“Joy was your visitor, a stranger, feeling awk- 
ward and unhappy, most probably, with the 
girls whom you knew so well, and not knowing 
anything about the matters which you talked 
over. You might, might you not, have by a 
little effort made her soon feel at home and 
happy ? Instead of that, you went off with the 


96 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


girls, and let her fall behind, with nobody but 
Winnie to talk to.” 

Gypsy’s face turned to a sudden crimson. 

“ Then, a nutting party was a new thing to 
Joy, and with the care of Winnie and all, it is 
no wonder she did not find it very pleasant, and 
she had never climbed a tree in her life. This 
was her first Saturday afternoon in Yorkbiiry, 
and she was, no doubt, feeling lonely and home- 
sick, and it made her none the happier to be 
laughed at for not doing something she had not 
the slightest idea how to do. Was it quite 
generous to let her start oflp alone, over a strange 
road, with the care of a crying — ” 

“And muddy,” put in Gypsy, with twink- 
ling eyes, “ from head to foot, black as a shoe.” 

“ And muddy child,” finished Mrs. Breyn- 
ton, smiling in spite of herself. 

“ But Joy wanted to take him, and I told her 
so. It was her own bargain.” 

‘ ‘ I know that. But we are not speaking of 


GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY. 97 

bargains, Gypsy ; we are spealdng of what is 
kind and generous. Now how does it strike 
you?” 

“It strikes me,” said Gypsy, in her honest 
way, after a moment’s pause, “it strikes me 
that I’m a horrid selfish old thing, and I’ve lived 
twelve years and just found it out ; there now ! ” 
Just as Gypsy was going to bed, she tuimed 
around with the lamp in her hand, her great 
eyes dreaming away in the brownest of brown 
studies. 

“ Mother, is it selfish to have upper drawers, 
and front sides, and things? ” 

“ What are you talking about, Gypsy?” 
“Why, don’t my upper drawers, and the 
front side of the bed, and all that, belong to 
me, and must I give them up to Joy ? ” 

“It is not necessary,” said her mother, laugh- 
ing. But Gypsy fancied there was a slight 
emphasis on the last word. 

Joy was sound asleep, and dreaming that 


7 


98 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Winnie was a rattle-snake and Gypsy a prairie- 
dog, when somebody gave her a little pinch and 
woke her up. 

‘ ‘ Oh — why — what’s the matter ? ” said 
Joy. 

“ Look here, you might just as well have the 
upper bureau drawers, you know, and I don’t 
care anything about the front side of the bed. 
Besides, I wish I hadn’t let you come home 
alone this afternoon.” 

‘‘Well, you are the funniest I ” said Joy. 


CHAPTEE VI. 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


I N Monday Joy went to school. Gypsy 
had been somewhat astonished, a little 
hurt, and a little angry, at hearing her 
say one day, that she “ didn^t think it 
was a fit place for her to go, — a high school 
where all the poor people went.” 

But fit or not, it was the only school to be 
had, and Joy must go. Perhaps, on some 
accounts, Mrs. Breynton would have preferred 
sending the children to a private school ; but the 
only one in town, and the one which Gypsy had 
attended until this term, was broken up by the 
marriage of the teacher, so she had no choice in 
the matter. The boys at the high school were 
( 99 ) . , 


100 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


some of them rude, but the girls for the most 
part were quiet, well-behaved, and ladylike, and 
the instruction was undoubtedly vastly superior 
to that of a smaller school. As Gypsy said, 
‘ ‘ you had to put into it and study like every- 
thing, or else she gave you a horrid old black 
mark, and then you felt nice when it was read, 
aloud at examination, didn’t you ? ” 

“ I wouldn’t care,” said Joy. 

“Why, Joyce Miranda Breynton ! ” said 
Gypsy. But Joy declared she wouldn’t, and it 
was very soon evident that she didn’t. She had 
not the slightest fancy for her studies, — neither 
had, Gypsy, for that matter; but Gypsy had 
been brought up to believe it was a disgrace to 
get bad marks. Joy had not. She hurried 
through her lessons in the quickest possible 
fashion, anyhow, so as to get through, and out 
to play ; and limped through her recitations as 
well as she could. Once Gypsy saw — and she 
was thoroughly shocked to see — Joy peep into 


WHO PUT IT m? 


101 


the leaves of her grammar, when Miss Car- 
drew’s eyes were turned the other way. 

Altogether, matters did not go on very com- 
fortably. Joy’s faults were for the most part 
those from which Gypsy was entirely free, and 
to which she had a special and inborn aversion. 
On the other hand, many of Gypsy’s failings 
were not natural to Joy. Gypsy was always 
forgetting things she ought to remember. Joy 
seldom did. Gypsy was thoughtless, impulsive, 
always into mischief, out of it, sorry for it, and 
in again. Joy did wrong deliberately, as she 
did everything else, and did not become penitent 
in a hurry. Gypsy’s temper was like a flash of 
Hghtning, hot and fierce, and melting right away 
in the softest of summer rains. When Joy was 
angry she s^ilked. Joy was precise and neat 
about everything. Gypsy was not. Then Joy 
kept stfll, and Gypsy talked ; Joy told parts of 
stories, Gypsy told the whole ; Joy had some 
foolish notions about money and dresses and 


102 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


jewelry, on which Gypsy looked with the most 
supreme contempt, — not on the dresses, but 
the notions. Therefore there was plenty of 
material for rubs and jars, and of all sad things 
to creep into a happy house, these rubs and jars 
are the saddest. 

One day both the girls woke full of mischief. 
It was a bracing November day, cool as an ice- 
cream and clear as a whistle. The air sparkled 
like a fountain of golden sands, and was as full 
of oxygen as it could hold; and oxygen, you 
must know, is at the bottom of a great deal of 
the happiness and misery, goodness and bad- 
ness, of this world. 

“ I tell you if I don’t feel like cutting up ! ” 
said Gypsy, on the way to school. Gypsy 
didn’t look unlike ‘‘ cutting up” either, walking 
along there with her satchel swung over her left 
shoulder, her turban set all askew on her bright, 
black hair, her cheeks flushed from the jumping 
of fences and running of races that had been 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


103 


going on since she left the house, and that saucy 
twinkle in her eyes. Joy was always somewhat 
more demure, but she looked, too, that morn- 
ing, as if she were quite as ready to have a good 
time as any other girl. 

“ Do you know,” said Gypsy, confidentially, 
as they ’went up the schoolhouse steps, “ I feel 
precisely as if I should make Miss Cardrew a 
great deal of trouble to-day ; don’t you ? ” 

“ What does she do to you if you do?” 

“ Oh, sometimes she keeps you after school, 
and then again she tells Mr. Guernsey, and 
then there are the bad marks. Miss Melville, — 
she’s my old teacher that married Mr. Hallam, 
she was just silly enough ! — well, she used to 
just look at you, and never open her lips, and I 
guess you wished you hadn’t, pretty quick.” 

It was very early yet, but quite a crowd was 
gathered in the schoolhouse, as was the fashion 
on cool mornings. The boys were stamping 
noisily over the desks, and grouped about the 


104 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


stove in No. 1. No. 1 was the large room 
where the whole school gathered for prayer. A 
few of the girls were there, — girls who laughed 
rudely and talked loudly, none of them Gypsy’s 
friends. Tom never liked to have Gypsy linger 
about in No. 1, before or after school hours ; he 
said it was not the place for her, and Tom was 
there that morning, knotting his handsome brows 
up into a very decided frown, when he saw her 
in the doorway, with Joy peeping over her 
shoulder. So Gypsy — somewhat reluctantly, 
it must be confessed, for the boys seemed to be 
having a good time, and with boys’ good times 
she had a most unconquerable sympathy — went 
up with J oy into Miss Cardrew’s recitation 
room. Nobody was there. A great, empty 
school-room, with its rows of silent seats and 
closed desks, with power to roam whithersoever 
you will, and do whatsoever you choose, is a 
great temptation. The girls ran over the desks, 
and looked into the desks, jumped over the set- 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


105 


tees, and knocked down the settees, put out the 
fire and built it up again, from the pure luxury 
of doing what they wanted to, in a place where 
they usually had to do what they didn’t want to. 
They sat in Miss Cardrew’s chair, and peeped 
into her desk ; they ate apples and snapped 
peanut shells on the very platform where sat the 
spectacled and ogre-eyed Committee on exam- 
ination days ; they drew all manner of pictures 
of funny old women without any head, and old 
men without any feet, on the awful blackboard, 
and played “tag” around the globes. Then 
they stopped for^ want of breath. 

“ I wish there were something to do,” sighed 
Gypsy ; ‘ ‘ something real splendid and funny.” 

“ I knew a girl once, and she drew a picture 
of the teacher on the board in green chalk,” 
suggested Joy ; “ only she lost her recess for a 
whole week after it.” 

“That wouldn’t do. Besides, pictures are 
too common ; everybody does those. Boys put 


106 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


pins in the seats, and cut off the legs of the 
teacher’s chair, and all that. I don’t know as I 
care to tumble Miss Cardrew over, — wouldn’t 
she look funny, though ! — ’cause mother 
wouldn’t like it. Couldn’t we make the stove 
smoke, or put pepper in the desks, or — let me 
see.” 

“ Dress up something somehow,” said Joy, 
“ there’s the poker.” 

G}"psy shook her head. 

“Delia Guest did that last term, ’n the old 
thing — I mean the poker, not Delia — went 
flat down in the corner behind The stove — flat, 
just as Miss Melville was coming in, and lay there 
in the wood-pile, and nobody knew there was a 
single sign of a thing going on. I guess you 
better believe Delia felt cheap ! — hark ! what’s 
that ? ” 

It was a faint miaow down in the yard. The 
girls ran to the window and looked out. 

“ A kitten I ” 

“ The very thing I ” 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


107 


“ I’m going right down to get her.” 

Down they ran, both of them, in a great 
hurry, and brought the creature up. The poor 
thing was chilled, and hungry, and frightened. 
They took her up to the stove, and Gypsy 
warmed her in her apron, and Joy fed her with 
cookies from her lunch-basket, till she curled 
her head under her paws with a merry purr, all 
ready for a nap, and evidently without the 
slightest suspicion that Gypsy’s lap was not 
foreordained, and created for her especial habita- 
tion as long as she might choose to remain 
there. 

“ Joy,” said Gypsy, suddenly, “ I’ve thought 
of something.” 

“ So have I.” 

“ To dress her — ” 

< ‘ Up in a handkerchief,” 

“ And things.” 

“ I know it.” 

‘ ‘ And put her — ” 


108 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ Yes ! into Miss Cardrew’s desk I 
“ Wont it be just — ” 

“ Splendid ! Hurry up I ” 

They “ hurried up” in good earnest, choking 
down their laughter so that nobody down stairs 
might hear it. Joy took her pretty, purple- 
bordered handkerchief and tied over the poor 
kitten’s head like a night-cap, so tight, that pull 
and scratch as she might, pussy could not get 
it off. Gypsy’s black silk apron was tied about 
her, like a long baby-dress, a pair of mittens 
were fastened on her arms, and a pink silk scarf 
around her throat. When all was done, Gypsy 
held her up, and trotted her on her knee. Any- 
body who has ever dressed up a cat like a baby, 
knows how indescribably funny a sight it is. 
It seemed as if the girls could never stop laugh- 
ing, — it does not take much to make girls 
laugh. At last there was a commotion in the 
entry below. 

“ It’^the girls I — quick, quick 1 ” 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


109 


Gypsy trying to get up, tripped on her dress 
and fell, and away flew the kitten all tangled in 
the apron, making for the door as fast as an 
enerofetic kitten could 2:0. 

“ She’ll be down stairs, and maybe Miss Car- 
drew’s there ! Oh ! ” 

Joy sprang after the creature, caught her by 
the very tip end of her tad just as she was pre- 
paring to pounce dowu the stairs, and ran with 
her to Miss Cardrew’s desk. 

“ Put her in — quick, quick ! ” 

“ 0 -oh, she wont lie still ! ” 

“ Where’s the lunch-basket? Give me some 
biscuit — there ! I hear them on the stairs ! ” 
The kitten began to mew piteously, struggling 
to get out with all her might. Down went the 
desk-cover on her paws. 

“ There now, lie still I Oh, hear her mew ! 
What shall we do ? ” 

Quick footsteps were on the stairs, — half- 
way up ; merry laughter, and a dozen voices. 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


110 


'■A 


“ Here’s the biscuit. Here, kitty, kitty, yoor 
kit-ty, do please to lie still and eat it I Oh, Joy 
Breynton, did you ever?” 

“ There, she’s eating I ” 

‘‘ Shut the desk, — hurry I ” 

When the girls came in, Joy and Gypsy were 
in their seats, looking over the arithmetic lesson. 
Joy’s book was upside down, and Gypsy was 
intensely interested in the preface. 

Miss Cardrew came in shortly after, and stood 
warming her fingers at the stove, nodding and 
smiling at the girls. All was still so far, in the 
desk. Miss Cardrew went up and laid down 
her gloves, and pushed back her chair. Joy 
coughed under her breath, and Gypsy looked up 
out of the corners of her eyes. 

“Mr. Guernsey is not well to-day,” began 
Miss Cardrew, standing by the desk, “ and we 
shall not be able to meet as usual in No. 1 for 
prayers. It has been thought best that each 
department should attend devotions in its own 
room. You can get out your Bibles.” 


^VHO PUT IT IN? 


Ill 


Gypsy looked at Joy, and Joy looked at 
Gypsy. 

Miss Cardrew sat down. It was very still. 
A muffled scratching sound broke into the pause. 
Miss Cardrew looked up carelessly as if to see 
where it came from ; it stopped. 

“ She’ll open her desk now,” whispered Joy, 
stooping to pick up a book. 

“ See here, Joy, I almost wish we hadn’t — ” 

“We will read the fourteenth chapter of 
John,” spoke up Miss Cardrew, with her Bible 
in her hand. No, she hadn’t opened her desk. 
The Bible lay upon the outside of it. 

“ Oh, if that biscuit ’ll only last tiU she gets 
through praying ! ” 

“ Hush-sh ! She’s looking this way.” 

Miss Cardrew began to read. She had read 
just four verses, when — 

‘ ‘ Miaow ! ” 

Gypsy and Joy were trying very hard to find 
the place. Miss Cardrew looked up and around 


112 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


the room. It was quite still. She read two 
verses more. 

“ Mi-aow ! mi-aow-aow ! ” 

Miss Cardrew looked up again, around the 
room, over the platform, under the desk, every- 
where but in it. 

“ Girls, did any of you make that sound?” 

Nobody had. Miss Cardrew began* to read 
again. All at once Joy pulled Gypsy’s sleeve. 

“ Just look there ! ” 

“ Where? ” 

< ‘ Trickling down the outside of the desk I ” 

“ You don’t suppose she’s upset the — 

‘ ‘ Ink-bottle, — yes.” 

Miss Cardrew was in the tenth verse, and the 
room was very still. Right into the stillness 
there broke again a distinct, prolonged, dolor- 
ous — 

‘ ‘ Mi-aow-aoii? ! ” 

And this time Miss Cardrew laid down her 
Bible and lifted the desk-cover. 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


113 


It is reported in school to this day that 
Miss Cardrew jumped. 

Out flew the kitten, like popped corn from a 
shovel, glared over the desk in the night-cap 
and black apron, leaped down, and flew, all 
dripping with ink, down the aisle, out of the 
door, and bouncing down stairs like an India- 
rubber ball. 

Delia Guest and one or two of the other girls, 
screamed. Miss Cardrew flung out some books 
and papers from the desk. It was too late ; they 
were dripping, and drenched, and black. The 
teacher quietly wiped some spots of ink from 
her pretty blue merino, and there was an awful 
silence. 

“Girls,” said Miss Cardrew then, in her 
grave, stern way, “ who did this?” 

Nobody answered. 

‘ ‘ Who put that cat in my desk ? ” repeated 
Miss Cardrew. 

It was perfectly still. Gypsy’s cheeks were 


8 


114 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


scarlet. Joy was looking carelessly about the 
room, scanning the faces of the girls, as if she 
w’ere trying to find out who was the guilty one. 

“ It is highly probable that the cat tied her- 
self into an apron, opened the desk and shut the 
cover down on herself,” said Miss Cardrew; 
“ we will look into this matter. Delia Guest, 
did you put her in ? ” 

“No ’m — he, he ! I guess I — ha, ha ! — 
didn’t,” said Delia. 

‘ ‘ Next ; ” — and down the first row went 
Miss Cardrew, asking the same question of every 
girl, and the second row, and the third. Gypsy 
sat on the end of the fourth settee. 

“ Gypsy Breynton, did you put the kitten in 
my desk ? ” 

“No ’m, I didn’t,” said Gypsy; which was 
true enough. It was Joy who did that part of 
it. 

“Did you have anything to do with the 
matter, Gypsy ? ” Perhaps Miss Cardrew re- 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


115 


membered that Gypsy had had something to do 
with a few other similar matters since she had 
been in school. 

“ Yes’m,” said honest Gypsy, with crimson 
face and hanging head, “ I did.” 

“ What did you do ? ” 

“ I put on the apron and the tippet, and — I 
gave her the biscuit. I — thought she’d keep 
still till prayers were over,” said Gypsy, faintly. 

“ But you did not put her in the desk? ” 

“ No ’m. 

“ And you know who did? ” 

“ Yes’m.” 

Miss Cardrew never asked her scholars to tell 
of each other’s wrong-doings. If she had, it 
would have made no difference to Gypsy. She 
had shut up her lips tight, and not another word 
would she have said for anybody. She had 
told the truth about herself, but she was under 
no obligations to bring Joy into trouble. Joy 
might do as she liked. 


116 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ Gypsy Breynton will lose her recesses for 
a week and stay an hour after school to-night,” 
said Miss Cardrew. “Joy, did you put the 
kitten in my desk ? ” 

“ No ma’am,” said Joy, boldly. 

“Nor have anything to do with it? ” 

“ No ma’am,” said Joy, without the slightest 
change of color. 

“ Next, — Sarah Eowe.” 

Of course Sarah had not, nor anybody else. 
Miss Cardrew let the matter drop there and 
went on with her reading. 

Gypsy sat silent and sorry, her eyes on her 
Testament. Joy tried to whisper something to 
her once, but Gypsy turned away with a ges- 
ture of impatience and disgust. This thing J oy 
had done, had shocked her so that she felt as if 
she could not bear the sight of her face, or 
touch of her hand. Never since she was a very 
little child, had Gypsy been known to say what 
was not true. All her words were like her 
eyes, — clear as sunbeams. 


WHO PUT IT IN? 


117 


At dinner Joy did all the talking. Mrs. 
Breynton asked Gypsy what was the matter 
but Gypsy said “ Nothing.” If Joy did not 
choose to tell of the matter, she would not. 

‘‘What makes you so cross?” said Joy, in 
the afternoon ; ‘ ‘ nobody can get a word out of 
you, and you don’t look at me any more than if 
I weren’t here.” 

“ I don’t see how you can ask such a ques- 
tion ! ” exploded Gypsy, with flashing eyes. 
“ You know what you’ve done as well as I do.” 

“ No, I don’t,” grumbled Joy ; just ’cause I 
didn’t tell Miss Cardrew about that horrid old 
cat — I wish we’d let the ugly thing alone ! — 
I don’t see why you need treat me as if I’d been 
murdering somebody and were going to be hung 
for it. Besides, I said ‘ Over the left ’ to my- 
self just after I’d told her, and I didn’t want to 
lose my recess if you did.” 

Gypsy shut up her pink lips tight, and made 


no answer. 


118 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Joy went out to play at recess, and Gypsy 
stayed in alone and studied. Joy went home 
with the girls in a great frolic after school, and 
Gypsy stayed shut up in the lonely school-room 
for an hour, disgraced and miserable. But I 
have the very best of reasons for thinking that 
she wasn’t nearly as miserable as Joy. 

Just before supper the two girls were sitting 
drearily together in the dining-room, when the 
door-bell rang. 

“ It’s Miss Cardrew ! ” said Joy, looking out 
of the window; “what do you suppose she 
wants ? ” 

Gypsy looked up carelessly ; she didn’t very 
much care. She had told Miss Cardrew all she 
had to tell, and received her punishment. As 
for her mother, she would have gone to her 
with the whole story that noon, if it hadn’t been 
for Joy’s part in it. 

“ What is that she has in her hand, I won- 
der?” said Joy uneasily, peeping through a 


WHO PUT IT m? 


119 


crack in the door as Miss Cardrew passed 
through the entry ; “ why, I declare ! if it isn’t 
a handkerchief, as true as you live — all — 
inky ! ” 

When Miss Cardrew had gone, Mrs. Breyn- 
ton came out of the parlor with a very grave 
face, a purple-bordered handkerchief in her 
hand ; it was all spotted with ink, and the ini- 
tials J. M. B. were embroidered on it. 

“Joy.” 

Joy came out of the corner slowly. 

“ Come here a minute.” 

Joy went and the door was shut. Just what 
happened that next half hour Gypsy never knew. 
Joy came up stairs at the end of it, red-eyed 
and crying, and gentle. 

Gypsy was standing by the window. 

“ Gypsy.” 

“ Well.” 

“ I love auntie dearly, now I guess I do.” 

“Of course,” said Gypsy; “everybody 
does.” 


120 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“I hadn’t the least idea it was so wicked, — 
not the least idea. Mother used to — ” 

But Joy broke off suddenly, with quivering, 
crimson lips. 

What that mother used to do Gypsy never 
asked ; J oy never told her, — either then, or at ‘ 
any other time. 


CHAPTEE VII. 


PEACE MAYTHOENE’S EOOM. 



? IS, too.” 

“ It isn’t, either.” 

“ I know just as well as you.” 

“No you don’t any such a thing. 
You’ve lived up here in this old country place 
all your life, and you don’t know any more 
about the fashions than Mrs. Surly.” 

‘ ‘ But I know it’s perfectly ridiculous to rig 
up in white chenille and silver pins, when any- 
body’s in such deep mourning as you. 1 
wouldn’t do it for anything.” 

“ I’ll take care of myself, if you please, 
Miss.” 

“ And Jknow another thing, too.” 


121 



122 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ You do ! A whole thing ! ” 

“ Yes, I do. I know you’re just as proud as 
you can be, and I’ve heard more ’n one person 
say so. All the girls think you’re dreadfully 
stuck up about your dresses and things — so 
there ! ” 

“I don’t care what the girls think, or you 
either. I guess I’ll be glad when father comes 
home and I get out of this house ! ” 

Joy fastened the gaudy silver pins with a jerk, 
into the heavy white chenille that she was tying 
about her throat and hair, turned herself about 
before the glass with a last complacent look, and 
walked, in her deliberate, cool, provoking way, 
from the room. Gypsy got up, and — slammed 
the door on her. 

Very dignified proceedings, certainly, for 
girls twelve and thirteen years old. An un- 
speakably important matter to quarrel about, — 
a piece of white chenille ! Angry people, be it 
remembered, are not given to over-much dig- 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’S ROOM. 


123 


nity, and how many quarrels are of the slightest 
importance ? 

Yet the things these two girls found to dispute, 
and get angry, and get miserable, and make the 
whole family miserable over, were so ridiculous- 
ly petty that I hardly expect to be believed in 
telling of them. The front side of the bed, the 
upper drawer in a bureau, a hair-ribbon, who 
should be helped first at the table, who was the 
best scholar, which was the more stylish color, 
drab or green, and whether Vermont wasn’t a 
^better State than Massachusetts, — such matters 
might very appropriately be the subjects of the 
dissensions of young ladies in pinafores and pan- 
talettes. 

Yet I think you will bear me witness, girls, 
some of you — ah, I know yOu by the sudden 
pink in your cheeks, — who have gone to live 
with a cousin, or had a cousin live with you, or 
whose mother has adopted an orphan, or taken 
charge of a missionary’s daughter, or in some 


124 


gipsy’s cousin joy. 


way or other have been brought for the first 
time in your life into daily and hourly collision 
with another young will just as strong and 
unbending as yours, — can’t you bear me wit- 
ness that, in these little contests between Joy 
and Gypsy, I am telling no “ made-up stories,” 
but sad, simple fact? 

If you can’t, I am very glad of it. 

No, as I said before, matters were not going 
on at all comfortably ; and every week seemed 
to make them worse. Wherein lay the trouble, 
and how to prevent it, neither of the girls had 
as yet exerted themselves to think. 

A week or two after the adventures that befel 
that unfortunate kitten, something happened 
which threatened to make the breach between 
G}"psy and Joy of a very serious nature. It 
began, as a great many other serious things 
begin, in a very small and rather funny affair. 

Mrs. Surly, who has been spoken of as 
Gypsy’s particular aversion, was a queer old 


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Gypsy and Tom playing Stick Knife. Page 125 






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PEACE MAYTHORNE’S ROOM. 


125 


lady with green glasses, who lived opposite Mr. 
Breynton’s, who felt herself particularly respon- 
sible for Gypsy’s training, and gave her good 
advice, double measure, pressed down and run- 
ning over. One morning it chanced that Gypsy 
was playing “ stick-knife ” with Tom out in the 
front yard, and that Mrs. Surly beheld from her 
parlor window, and that Mrs. Surly was 
shocked. She threw up her window, and called 
in an awful voice — 

“ Jemima Breynton !” 

Now you might about as well challenge Gypsy 
to a duel as call her J emima ; so — 

‘ ‘ What do you want ? ” she said, none too 
respectfully. 

“ I have something to say to you, Jemima 
Breynton.” 

‘ ‘ Say ahead,” said Gypsy, under her breath, 
and did not stir an inch. Distance certainly 
lent enchantment to the view when Mrs. Surly 
was in the case. 


126 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


‘ ‘ Does your ma allow you to be so bold as to 
play boys’ games with boys, right out in sight 
of folks?” vociferated Mrs. Surly. 

“Certainly,” nodded Gypsy; “it’s your 
turn, Tom.” 

“Well, it’s my opinion, Gypsy Breynton, 
you’re a romp. You’re nothing but a romp, 
and if I was your ma — ” 

Tom dropped his knife just then, stood up 
and looked at Mrs. Surly. For reasons best 
known to herself, Mrs. Surly shut the window, 
and contented herself with glaring through the 
glass. 

Now Joy had stood in the doorway and been 
witness to the scene, and moreover, having been 
reproved by her aunt for something or other that 
morning, she felt ill humored, and very ready 
to find fault in her turn. 

“ I think it’s just so, anyway,” she said ; “ i 
wouldn’t be seen playing stick-knife for a good 
deal.” 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’S ROOM. 


127 


“And I wouldn’t be seen telling lies!” 
retorted Gypsy, — sorry for it the minute she 
had said it. Then there followed a highly 
interesting dialogue of about five minutes’ 
length, and of such a character that Tom 
speedily took his departure. 

Now it came about that G5^sy, as usual, was 
the first ready to “make up,” and she turned 
over plan after plan in her mind, to find some- 
thing pleasant she could do for Joy. At last, 
as the greatest treat she could think of to ofier 
her, she said — 

“I’ll tell you what ! Let’s go down to Peace 
Maythorne’s. I do believe I haven’t taken you 
there since you’ve been in Yorkbury.” 

“Who’s Peace Maythorne?” asked Joy, 
sulkily. 

“Well, she’s the person I love just about best 
of anybody.” 

‘ ‘ Best of anybody I ” 

“ Oh, mother of course, and Tom, and Win- 


i 


128 


gypsy's cousin joy. 


nie, and father, and all those. Kelations don't 
count. But I do love her as well as anybody 
but mother — and Tom, and -7- well, anyway, 
I love her dreadfully." 

“ What is she, a woman, or a girl, or what ? " 

“ She's an angel," said Gypsy. 

‘ ‘ What a goose you are ! " ^ 

“ Very likely; but whether I’m a goose or 
not, she’s an angel. I look for the wings every 
time I see her. She has the sweetest little way 
of keeping 'em folded up, and you're always on 
the jump, thinking you see ’em." 

‘ ‘ How you talk ! I’ve a good mind to go 
and see her." 

“ All right.” 

So away they went, as pleasant as a summer's 
day, merrily chatting. 

“ But I don’t think angels are very nice, gen- 
erally,” said Joy, doubtingly. “ They preach. 
Does Peace May thorne preach ? I shan't like 
her if she does.” 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’S ROOM. 129 

“Peace preach I Not like her! You’d 
better know what you’re talking about, if you’re 
going to talk,” said Gypsy, with heightened 
color. 

“Dear me, you take a body’s head off! 
Well, if she should preach, I shall come right 
home.” 

They had come now to the village, where 
were the stores and the post-office, the bank, 
and some handsome dwelling-houses. Also the 
one paved sidewalk of Yorkbury, whereon the 
young people did their promenading after school 
in the afternoon. Joy always fancied coming 
here, gay in her white chenille and white rib- 
bons, and dainty parasol lined with white silk. 
There is nothing so showy as showy mourning, 
and Joy made the most of it. 

‘ ‘ Why, where are you going ? ” she exclaimed 
at last. Gypsy had turned away from the fash- 
ionable street, and the handsome houses, and 
the paved sidewalk. 


9 


130 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“To Peace Maythorne’s.” 

“ This way ? ” 

“ This way.” 

The street into which Gypsy had turned was 
narrow and not over clean ; he houses un- 
painted and low. As they walked on it grew 
narrower and dirtier, and the houses became 
tenement houses only. 

‘ ‘ Do for pity’s sake hurry and get out of 
here,” said Joy, daintily holding up her dress. 
Gypsy walked on and said nothing. Red-faced 
women in ragged dresses began to cluster on 
the steps ; muddy-faced children screamed and 
quarrelled in the road. At the door of a large 
tenement-building, somewhat neater than the 
rest, but miserable enough, Gypsy stopped. 

“ What are you stopping for ? ” said Joy. 

“ This is where she lives.” 

“ Here ! ” 

“ I just guess she does,” put in a voice from 
behind ; it was Wimiie, who had followed them 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’s ROOM. 


131 


on tip-toe unknown to them, all the way. 
“ She’s got a funny quirk in her back, ’n she 
lies down pretty much. That’s her room up 
there to the top of the house. It’s a real nice 
place, I tell you. They have onions mos’ every 
day. Besides, I saw a little boy here one time 
when I was cornin’ ’long with mother, ’n he was 
smokin’ some tobaccer. He said he’d give it to 
me for two nappies, and mother just wouldn’t 
let me.” 

‘ ‘ Here — a cripple ! ” exclaimed J oy . 

“ Here, and a cripple,” said Gypsy, in a 
queer tone, looking very straight at Joy. 

“You ought to be ashamed of yourself!” 
broke out Joy, “ playing such a trick on me. 
Do you suppose Fm going into such a place as 
this, to see an old beggar, — a hunch-backed 
beggar ? ” 

Gypsy turned perfectly white. When she 
was very angry, too angry to speak, she always 
turned white. It was sonre seconds before she 
could find her voice. 


132 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ A hunch-hacTced beggar ! Peace? How 
dare you say such things of Peace May thorne ? 
Joy Breynton, I’ll never forgive you for .this as 
long as I live — never ! ” 

The two girls looked at each other. Just at 
that moment I am afraid there was something in 
their hearts answering to that forbidden word, 
that terrible word — hate. Ah, we feel so safe 
from it in our gentle, happy, untempted lives, 
just as safe as they felt once. Remember this, 
girls ; when Love goes out^ Hate comes in. In 
your heart there stands an angel, watching, 
silent, on whose lips are kindly words, in whose 
hands are patient, kindly deeds, whose eyes see 
“ good in everything,” something to love where 
love is hardest, some generous, gentle way to 
show that love, when ways seem closed. In 
your heart, too, away down in its darkest 
corner, all forgotten, perhaps, by you, crouches 
something with face too black to look upon, 
something that likewise watches and waits with 


i’EACE MATTHOKNE’S ROOM. 


133 


horrible patience, if perhaps the angel, with 
folded wing and drooping head, may be driven 
out. It is never empty, — this curious, fickle 
heart. One or the other must stand there, king 
of it. One or the other, — and in the twinkling 
of an eye the change is made, from angel to 
fiend, from fiend to angel; just which you 
choose. 

Joy broke away from her cousin in a passion. 
Gypsy flew into the door of the miserable 
house, up the stairs two steps at a time, to the 
door of a low room in the second story, and 
rushed in without knocking. 

“ Oh, Peace Maythorne ! ” 

The cripple lying on the bed, turned her pale 
face to the door, her large, quiet eyes blue with 
wonder. 

Why, Gypsy ! What is the matter?” 

Gypsy’s face was white still, very white. 
She shut the door loudly, and sat down on the 
bed with a jar that shook it all over. A faint 
expression of pain crossed the face of Peace. 


134 


gypsy's cousin joy. 


“ Oh, I didn’t mean to, — it was cruel in 
me ! How could I ? Have I hurt you very 
badly, Peace?” Gypsy slipped down upon the 
floor, the color coming into her face now, from 
shame and sorrow. Peace gently motioned her 
back to her place upon the bed, smiling. 

‘‘Oh, no. It was nothing. Sit up here; 
I like to have you. Now, what is it, Gypsy?” 

The tone of this “ What is it, Gypsy?” told 
a great deal. It told that it was no new thing 
for Gypsy to come there just so, with her 
troubles and her joys, her sins and her well- 
doings, her plans and hopes and fears, all the 
little stories of the fresh, young life from which 
the cripple was forever shut out. It told, too, 
what Gypsy found in this quiet room, and took 
away from it, — all the help and the comfort, 
and the sweet, sad lessons. It told besides, 
much of wliat Peace and Gypsy were to each 
other, that only they two should ever exactly 
understand. It was a tone that always soft- 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’S ROOM. 


135 


ened Gypsy, in her gayest frolics, in her wildest 
moods. For the first time since she had known 
Peace, it failed to soften her now. 

She began in her impetuous way, her face 
angry and flushed, her voice trembling yet : — 
“ I can’t tell you what it is, and that’s the 
thing of it 1 It’s about that horrid old Joy.” 

“ Gypsy ! ” 

“ I can’t help it, — I hate her ! ” 

“ Gypsy.” 

Gypsy’s eyes fell at the gentle word. 

“ Well, I felt just as if I did, down there on 
the steps, anyway. You don’t know what Joy 
said. It’s something about )^ou, and that’s what 
makes me so mad. If she ever says it again I ” 
“ About me? ” interrupted Peace. 

“Yes,” said Gypsy, with great, flashing 
eyes, “I wouldn’t tell it to you for all the 
world ; it’s so bad as that. Peace. How she 
dared to call you a beg — ” 

Gypsy stopped short. But she had let the 
cat out of the bag. Peace smiled again. 


136 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ A beggar? Well, it doesn’t hurt me any, 
does it? Joy has never seen me, doesn’t know 
me, you must remember, Gypsy. Besides, 
nobody else thinks as much of me as you do.” 

‘ ‘ I didn’t mean to say that ; I’m always say- 
ing the wrong thing ! Anyway, that isn’t all 
of it, and I did think I should strike her when 
she said it. I can’t bear Joy. You don’t know 
what she is. Peace. She grows worse and 
worse. She does things I wouldn’t do for any- 
thing, and I wish she’d never come here ! ” 

“ Is Joy always wrong?” asked Peace, gen- 
tly. Peace rarely gave to any one as much 
of a reproof as that. Gypsy felt it. 

“No,” said she, honestly, “she isn’t. I’m 
real horrid and wicked, and do ugly things. 
But I can’t help it ; Joy makes me, — she acts 
so.” 

‘ ‘ I know what’s the matter with you and Joy, 
I guess,” said Peace. 

“ The matter? Well, I don’t ; I wish I did. 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’S ROOM. 


137 


We’re always fight, fighting, day in and day 
out, and I’m tired to death of it. I’m just 
crazy for the time for Joy to go home, and I’m 
dreadfully unhappy having her round, now I 
am. Peace.” 

Gypsy drew down her merry, red lips, and 
looked very serious. To teU the truth, however, 
do the best she would, she could not look alto- 
gether as if her heart were breaking from the 
amount of ‘ ‘ unhappiness ” that fell to her lot. 
A little smile quivered around the lips of Peace. 

“Well,” said Gypsy, laughing in spite of 
herself, “I am. I never can make anybody 
believe it, though. What is the matter with 
Joy and me? You didn’t say.” 

“ You’ve forgotten something, I think.” 

‘ ‘ Forgotten something ? ” 

“Yes, — something you read me once out of 
an old Book.” 

“Book? Oh,” said Gypsy, beginning to 
understand. 


138 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ In honor preferring one another,” said 
Peace, softly. Gypsy did not say anything. 
Peace took up her Bible that lay on the bed 
beside her, — it always lay on the bed, — and 
turned the leaves, and laid her finger on the 
verse. Gypsy read it through before she spoke. 
Then she said slowly — 

‘ ‘ Why, Peace Maythome. I — never could 
— in this world — never.” 

Just then there came a knock at the door. 
Gypsy went to open it, and stood struck dumb 
for amazement. It was Joy. 

“Auntie said it was supper-time, and you 
were to come home,” began Joy, somewhat 
embarrassed. “ She was going to send Winnie, 
but I thought I’d come.” 

“ Why, I never ! ” said Gypsy, still standing 
with the door-knob in her hand. 

“ Is this your cousin? ” spoke up Peace. . 

“Oh, yes, I forgot. This is Peace May- 
thorne, Joy.” 


PEACE MAYTHOENE’S EOOM. 


139 


“I am glad to see you,” said Peace, in her 
pleasant way ; ‘ ‘ won’t you come in ? ” 

“Well, perhaps I will, a minute,” said 
Joy awkwardly, taking a chair by the window, 
and wondering if Gypsy had told Peace 
what she said. But Peace was so cordial, her 
voice so quiet, and her eyes so kind, that she 
concluded she knew nothing about it, and soon 
felt quite at her ease. Everybody was at ease 
with Peace Maythorne. 

“ How pleasant it is here ! ” said Joy, look- 
ing about the room in unfeigned astonishment. 

o o 

And indeed it was. The furniture was poor 
enough, but everything was as neat as fresh 
wax, and the sunlight, that somehow or other 
always sought that room the earliest, and left it 
the latest, — the warm, shimmering sunlight 
that Peace so loved, — was yellow on the old, 
faded carpet, on the paperless, pictureless wall, 
on the bed where the hands of Peace lay, pa- 
tient and folded. 


140 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ It is pleasant,” said Peace, heartily. 
“You don’t know how thankful it makes me. 
Aunt came very near taking a room on the 
north side. Sometimes I really don’t know 
what I should have done. But then, I guess I 
should have found something else to like.” 

I should have found something else. A sudden 
thought came to the two girls then, in a dim, 
childish way, — a thought they could by no 
means have explained : they wondered if in 
those few words did not lie the key to Peace 
May thorn e’s beautiful, sorrowful life. They 
would not have expressed it so ; but that was 
what they meant. 

“ See here,” broke out Gypsy all at once, 
“ Peace Maythorne wants you and me to make 
up, Joy.” 

“ Your cousin will think I’m interfering with 
what’s none of my business,” said Peace, laugh- 
ing ; “I didn’t say exactly that, you know ; I 
was only talking to you.” 


PEACE MAYTHOENE’S BOOM. 


141 


“ Oh, rd just as lief make up now, but 
I wouldn’t this morning,” said Joy, wondering 
for the second time if Peace could know what 
she said, and be so gentle and good to her; 
“ I will if Gypsy will.” 

“ And I will if Joy will,” said Gypsy, “ so 
it’s a bargain.” 

‘ ‘ Do you have a great deal of pain ? ” asked 
Joy, as they rose to go, with real sympathy in 
her puzzled eyes. 

“ Oh, yes ; but then I get along.” 

‘ ‘ Peace Maythorne ! ” put in Gypsy just 
then, “ is that all the dinner you ate?” Gypsy 
was standing by the table on which was a plate 
containing a cold potato, a broken piece of 
bread, and a bit of beefsteak. Evidently, 
from the looks of the food, only a few mouth- 
fuls had been eaten. 

“ I didn’t feel hungry,” said Peace, evasively. 

“ But you like meat, for you told me so.” 

“ I didn’t care about this,” said Peace, look- 
ing somewhat restless. 


142 gypsy’s cousin joy. 

Gypsy looked .at her sharply, then stooped 
and whispered a few words in her ear. 

“No,” said Peace, her white cheek flushing 
crimson. “ Oh, no ; she never told me not to. 
She means to be very kind. I cost her a great 
deal.” 

‘ ‘ But yon knew she’d be glad if you didn’t 
eat much, and that was the reason you didn’t,” 
exclaimed Gypsy, angrily. “ I think it’s abom- 
inable ! ” 

“ Hush ! please, Gypsy.” 

Gypsy hushed. Just then the door opened 
and Miss Jane Maythorne, Peace’s aunt, came 
in. She was a tall, thin, sallow-faced woman, 
with angular shoulders and a sharp chin. She 
looked like a New England woman who had 

worked hard all her life and had much trouble ; 

# 

so much that she thought of little else now, but 
work and trouble ; who had a heart somewhere, 
but was apt to forget all about it except on great 
occasions. 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’S ROOM. 


145 


“ I’ve been talking to Peace about not eating 
more,” said Gypsy, when she had introduced 
Joy, and said good afternoon. “ She’ll die if 
she doesn’t eat more than that,” pointing to the 
plate. 

“ She can eat all she wants, as far as I 
know,” said Aunt Jane, rather shortly. “ No- 
body ever told her not to. It’s nothing very 
fine in the way of victuals I can get her, work- 
ing as I work for two, and most beat out every 
night. La ! Peace, you haven’t eaten your 
meat, have you? Well, I’ll warm it over to- 
morrow, and it’ll be as good as new.” 

“ The old dragon ! ” exclaimed Gypsy, under 
her breath, as the girls went out. “ She is a 
dragon, nothing more nor less, — a dragon that 
doesn’t scold particularly, but a dragon that 
looks, I’d rather be scolded to death than looked 
at and looked at every mouthful I eat. I don’t 
wonder Peace doesn’t eat. She’ll starve to 
death some day.” 


144 


gypsy's cousin joy. 


But why don’t you send her down things?’' 
asked Joy. Gypsy shook her head. 

‘ ‘ You don’t understand Peace. She wouldn’t 
like it. Mother does send her a quantity of 
books and flowers and things, and dinner just 
as often as she can without making Peace feel 
badly. But Peace wouldn’t like ’em every 
day.” 

“ She’s real different from w^hat I thought,” 
said Joy, “real. What pretty eyes she has. 
I didn’t seem to remember she was poor, a bit.” 

^ ‘ What made you come down ? ” 

“ ’Cause,” said Joy. 

This excellent reason was all that was ever to 
be had out of her. But that first time was by 
no means the last she went to Peace May thorne’s 
room. 

The girls were in good spirits that night, well 
pleased with each other, themselves, and every- 
body else, as is usually the case when one is 
just over a fit of ill temper. When they were 


PEACE MAYTHORNE’s ROOM. 


145 


alone in bed, Gypsy told Joy about the verse of 
which Peace spoke. Joy listened in silence. 

Awhile after, Gypsy woke from a dream, and 
saw a light burning on the table. Joy was 
sitting up in her white night-dress, turning the 
leaves of a Book as if she were hunting for 
something. 


10 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT, 


t OVEMBER with its bright, bleak skies, 
sere leaves tossing, sad winds sobbing. 



and rains that wept for days and nights 


% together, on dead flowers and dying 
grasses, moaned itself away at last, and Decem- 
ber swept into its place with a good rousing 
snow-storm, merry sleigh-bells, and , bright 
promises of coming Christmas. The girls 
coasted and skated, and made snow-men and 
snowballs and snow-forts. Joy learned to 
slide down a moderate hill at a mild rate without 
screaming, and to get along somehow on her 
skates alone, — for the very good reason that 


146 



THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


147 


Tom wouldn’t help her. Gypsy initiated her 
into the mysteries of ‘ ‘ cannon-firing ” from the 
great icy forts, and taught her how to roll the 
huge balls of snow. Altogether they had a very 
good time. Not as good as they might have 
had, by any means ; the old rubs and jars were 
there still, though of late they had been some- 
what softened. Partly on account of their talk 
with Peace ; partly because of a certain uncom- 
fortable acquaintance called conscience ; partly 
because of their own good sense, the girls had 
tacitly made up their minds at least to make an 
effort to live together more happily. In some 
degree they succeeded, but they were like people 
walking over a volcano : the trouble was not 
quenched ; it lay always smouldering out of 
sight, ready at a moment’s notice to flare up 
into angry flame. The fault lay perhaps no 
more with one than another. Gypsy had never 
had a sister, and her brothers were neither of 
them near enough to her own age to interfere 


148 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


very much with her wishes and privileges. 
Moreover, a brother, though he may be the 
greatest tease in existence, is apt to be easier to 
get along with than a sister about one’s own 
age. His pleasures and ambitions run in dif- 
ferent directions from the girls’; there is less 
clashing of interests. Besides this, Gypsy’s 
playmates in Yorkbury, as has been said, had 
not chanced to be girls of very strong wills. 
Quite to her surprise, since Joy had been her 
room-mate and constant companion, had she 
found out that she — Gypsy — had been pretty 
well used to having her own way, and that 
other people sometimes liked to have theirs. 

As for Joy, she had always been an -only 
child, and that tells a history. Of the two 
perhaps she had the more to learn. The simple 
fact that she was brought wisely and kindly, but 
thoroughly, under Mrs. Breynton’s control, was 
decidedly a revelation to her. At her own 
home, it had always been said, from the time 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


149 


she was a baby, that her mother could not 
manage her, and her father would not. She 
rebelled a little at first against her aunt’s author- 
ity, but she was fast learning to love her, and 
when we love, obedience ceases to be obedience, 
and becomes an offering freely given. 

A little thing happened one day, showing that 
sadder and better side of Joy’s heart that always 
seemed to touch Gypsy. 

They had been having some little trouble 
about the lessons at school ; it just verged on a 
quarrel, and slided off, and they had treated 
each other pleasantly after it. At night Joy 
was sitting up-stairs writing a letter to her 
father, when a gust of wind took the sheet and 
blew it to Gypsy’s feet. Gypsy picked it up to 
carry it to her, and in doing so, her eyes fell 
accidentally on some large, legible words at the 
bottom of the page. She had not the slightest 
intention of reading them, but their meaning 
came to her against her will, in that curious 


150 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


way we see things in a flash, sometimes. This 
was what she saw : 

‘‘ I like auntie ever so much, and Tom. 
Gypsy was cross this morning. She — ” and 
then followed Joy’s own version of the morn- 
ing’s dispute. Gypsy was vexed. She liked 
her uncle, and she did not like to have him hear 
such one-sided stories of her, and judge her as 
he would. 

She walked over to Joy with very red cheeks. 

“ Here’s your letter. I tried not to read it, 
but I couldn’t help seeing that about me. I 
don’t think you’ve any business to tell him about 
me unless you can tell the truth.” 

Of course Joy resented such a remark as 
this, and high words followed. They went 
down to supper sulkily, and said nothing to one 
another for an hour. After tea, Joy crept up 
moodily into the corner, and Gypsy sat down 
on the cricket for one of her merry talks with 
her mother. After she had told her how many 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


151 


times she missed at school that day, what a 
funny tumble Sarah Kowe had on the ice, and 
laughed over ‘ ‘ Winnie’s Latest ” till she was 
laughed out and talked out too, she sprang into 
her lap, in one of Gypsy’s sudden outbursts of 
affection, throwing her arms around her neck, 
and kissing her on cheeks, forehead, lips, and 
chin. 

“ 0-oh, what a blessed little mother you are ! 
What should I do without you ? ” 

‘ ‘ Mother’s darlin^ daughter ! What should 
she do without you?” said Mrs. Breynton, 
softly. 

But not softly enough. Gypsy looked up 
suddenly and saw a pale face peering out at 
them from behind the curtain, its great eyes 
swimming in tears, its lips quivering. The 
next minute Joy left the room. 

There was something dim in Gypsy’s eyes as 
she hurried after her. She found her crouched 
up-stairs in the dark and cold, sobbing as if 


152 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


her heart would break. Gypsy put her arm 
around her. 

“ Kiss me, Joy.” 

Joy kissed her, and that was all that was 
said. But it ended in Gypsy’s bringing her 
triumphantly down-stairs, where were the lights 
and the fire, and the pleasant room, and another 
cricket waiting at Mrs. Breynton’s feet. 

They were very busy after this, with the 
coming Christmas. Joy confidently expected a 
five-dollar bill from her father, and Gypsy cher- 
ished faint aspirations after a portfolio with 
purple roses on it. But most of their thoughts, 
and all their energies, were occupied with the 
little gifts they intended to make themselves ; 
and herein lay a difficulty. Joy’s father always 
supplied her bountifully with spending money ; 
Gypsy’s stock was small. When Joy wanted 
to make a present, she had only to ask for a few 
extra dollars, and she had them. Gypsy 
always felt as if a present given in that way 


THE STOHY OF A NIGHT. 


153 


were no present ; unless a thing cost her some 
self-denial, or some labor, she reasoned, it had 
nothing to do with her. If given directly out 
of her father’s pocket, it was his gift, not hers. 

But then, how much handsomer Joy’s things 
would be. 

Thus Gypsy was thinking, in her secret heart, 
over and over ; how could she help it ? And 
Joy, perhaps — possibly — Joy was thinking 
the same thing, with a spice of pleasure in the 
thought. 

It was about her mother that Gypsy was chiefly 
troubled. Tom had condescendingly informed 
her about six months ago, that he’d just as lief she 
would make him a watch-case if she wanted to 
very much ; girls always would jump at the chance 
to get up any such nonsense, — be sure she did it 
up in style, with gold and silver tape, and some 
of your blue alpacca. (Tom’s conceptions of the 
feminine race, their apparel, occupations, and im- 
plements, were bounded by tape and alpacca.) 


154 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


So Tom was provided for ; the watch-case was 
nearly made, and bade fair to be quite as pretty 
as anything Joy could buy. Winnie was easily 
suited, and her father would be as contented 
with a shaving-case as with a velvet dressing- 
gown ; indeed he’d hardly know the diiference. 
Joy should have a pretty white velvet hair- 
ribbon. But what for her mother? She lay 
awake a whole half hour one night, perplexing 
herself over the question, and at last decided 
rather falteringly on a photograph-frame of 
shell-work. Gypsy’s shell-work was always 
pretty, and her mother had a peculiar fancy for 
it. 

“ J shall give her Whittier’s poems,” said 
Joy, in — perhaps unconsciously, perhaps not — 
a rather triumphant tone. “I heard her say 
the other day she wanted them ever so much. 
I’m going to get the best copy I can find, with 
gold edges. If uncle hasn’t a nice one in his 
store. I’ll send to Boston. Mr. Ticknor ’ll pick 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


155 


me out the best one he has, I know, ’cause he 
knows father real well, and we buy lots of things 
there.” 

Gypsy said nothing. She was rather abashed 
to hear Joy talk in such familiar terms of Mr. 
Ticknor. She was more uneasy that Joy 
should give so handsome a present. She sat 
looking at her silently, and while she looked, a 
curious, dull, sickening pain crept into her 
heart. It frightened her, and she ran away 
down-stairs to get rid of it. 

A few days after, she was sitting alone work- 
ing on the photograph-case. It was rather 
pretty work, though not over-clean. She had 
cut a well-shaped frame out of pasteboard, with 
a long, narrow piece bent back to serve as sup- 
port. The frame was covered with putty, and 
into the putty she fastened her shells. They 
were of different sizes, shapes, and colors, and 
she was laying them on in a pretty pattern of 
stars and crescents. She had just stopped to 


156 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


look at her work, her red lips shut together 
with the air of a connoisseur, and her head on 
one side, like a canary, when Joy came in. 

“Just look here!” and she held up before 
her astonished eyes a handsome volume of blue 
and gold, — Whittier’s poems, and written on 
the fly-leaf, in Joy’s very best copy-book hand, 
‘ ‘ For Auntie, with a Merry Christmas from 
Joy.” 

“Uncle sent to Boston for me, and got it, 
and he promised on his word ’n honor, certain 
true, black and blue, he wouldn’t let Auntie 
know a single sign of a thing about it. Isn’t 
it splendid ? ” 

“ Ye-es,” said Gypsy, slowly. 

“Well! I don’t think you seem to care 
much.” 

Gypsy looked at her shell-work, and said 
nothing. For the second time that dull, curious 
pain had crept into her heart. What did it 
mean? Was it possible that she was envitms 
of J oy ? W as it possible ? 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


157 


^The hot crimson rushed to Gypsy’s cheeks for 
shame at the thought. But the thought was 
there. 

She chanced to be in Peace Maythorne’s room 
one day when the bustle of preparation for the 
holidays was busiest. Peace hid something 
under the counterpane as she came in, flushing 
a little. Gypsy sat down in her favorite place 
on the bed, just where she could see the cripple’s 
great quiet eyes, — she always liked to watch 
Peace Maythorne’s eyes, — and in doing so, 
disturbed the bedclothes. A piece of work fell 
out ; plain, fine sewing, in which the needle lay 
with a stitch partially taken. 

“ Peace Maythorne ! ” said Gypsy, “ you’ve 
been doing it again ! ” 

“ A little, just to help aunt, you know. A 
little doesn’t hurt me, Gypsy.” 

“ Doesn’t ‘ hurt you I Peace, you know 
better. You know you never sew a stitch but 
you lie awake half the night after it with the 
pain.” 


158 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Peace did not contradict her. She could 
not. 

‘ ‘ Help your aunt ! ” Gypsy went on vehe- 
mently ; ‘ ‘ she oughtn’t to let you touch it. She 
hasn’t any more feeling than a stone wall, nor 
half as much, I say ! ” 

“Hush, Gypsy! Don’t say that. Indeed 
I’d rather have the pain, and help her a little, 
once in a while, when my best days come and I 
can ; I had, really, Gypsy. You don’t know 
how it hurts me — a great deal more than this 
other hurt in my back — to lie here and let her 
support me, and I not do a thing. O Gypsy, 
you dcfh’t know I ” 

Something in Peace Maythorne’s tone just 
then, made G}^sy feel worse than she felt to see 
her sew. She was silent a minute, turning 
away her face. 

“ Well, I suppose I don’t. But I say I’d as 
lief have a stone wall for an aunt ; no, I will 
say it Peace, and you needn’t look at me. 


THE STOKY OF A NIGHT. 


159 


Peace looked, notwithstanding, and Gypsy 
stopped saying it. 

“ Sometimes Pve thought,” said Peace, after 
a pause, “ I might earn a little crocheting. 
Once, long ago, I made a mat out of ends of 
worsted I found, and it didn’t hurt me hardly 
any ; on my good days it wouldn’t honestly hurt 
me at all. It’s pretty work crocheting, isn’t 
it?” 

“ Why don’t you crochet, then? ” said Gypsy, 
“if you must do anything. It’s ten thousand 
times easier than this sewing you’re killing your- 
self over.” 

“ I’ve no worsteds, you know,” said Peace, 
coloring ; and changed the subject at once. 

Gypsy looked thoughtful. Very soon after, 
she bade Peace good-by, and went home. 

That night she called her mother away alone, 
and told her what Peace had said. 

“ Now, mother, I’ve thought out an idea.” 
“WeU?” 



160 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ You mustn’t say no, if I tell you.” ' ' ' 

“ rU try not to ; if it is a sensible idea.” 

‘‘ Do I ever have an idea that isn’t sensible?” 
said Gypsy, demurely. “ I prefer not to be 

■ 

slandered if you please, Mrs. Breynton.” 

“ Well, but what’s the idea? ” 

“It’s just this. Miss Jane Maythorne is a 
heathen.” j 

‘ ‘ Is that all ? ” j 

“No. But Miss Jane Maythorne is a 
heathen, and ought to cut off her head before 
she lets Peace sew. But you see she doesn’t 
know she’s a heathen, and Peace will sew.” 

“Well, what then? ” 

“ If she will do something, and won’t be 
happy without, then I can’t help it, you see. 

But I can give her some worsteds for a Christ- 
mas present, and she can make little mats and 
things, and you can buy them. Now, mother, 
isn’t that nice ? ” 

“ Yes,” said Mrs. Breynton, after a moment’s 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 161 

thought, “ it is a very good plan. I think Joy 
yWould like to join you. Together, you can 
make quite a handsome present out of it.” 

“ I don’t want Joy to know a thing about it,” 
said Gypsy, with a decision in her voice that 
amounted almost to anger. 

“ Why, Gypsy ! ” 

“No, not a thing. She just takes her 
father’s money, and gives lots of splendid pres- 
ents, and makes me ashamed of all mine, and 
she’s glad of it, too. If I’m going to give any- 
thing to Peace, I don’t want her to.” 

‘ ‘ I think J oy has taken a great fancy to 
Peace. She would enjoy giving her something 
very much,” said Mrs. Breynton, gravely. 

“ I can’t help it. Peace Maythorne belongs 
to me. It would spoil it all to have Joy have 
anything to do with it.” 

“ Worsteds are very expensive now,” said her 
mother ; ‘ ‘ you alone cannot give Peace enough 
to amount to much.” 


14 * 


162 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“I don’t care,” said Gypsy, resolutely, “I 
want to do one thing Joy doesn’t.” 

Mrs. Breynton said nothing, and Gypsy went 
slowly from the room. 

“ I wish we could give Peace Maythorne 
something,” said Joy, an hour after, when they 
were all sitting together. Mrs. Breynton raised 
her eyes from her work, but Gypsy was looking 
out of the window. 

When the girls went up to bed, Gjrpsy was 
very silent. Joy tried to laugh and plague and 
seold her into talking, but it was of no use. 
Just before they went to sleep, she spoke up 
suddenly, — 

“Joy, do you want to give something to 
Peace Maythorne ? ” 

“Splendid I” cried Joy, jumping up in bed 
to clap her hands, “ what? ” 

Gypsy told her then all the plan, a little 
slowly ; it was rather hard. 

Perhaps Joy detected the hesitation in her 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


163 


tone. Joy was not given to detecting things 
with remarkable quickness, but it was so plain 
she could not very w^ell help it. 

“ I don’t believe you want me to give any 
of it.” 

“ Oh, yes,” said Gypsy, trying to speak cor- 
dially, “ yes, it will be better.” 

It certainly was better she felt. She went to 
sleep, glad it was settled so. 

When the girls came to make their purchases, 
they found that Gypsy’s contribution of money 
would just about buy the crochet-needles and 
patterns. The worsteds cost about treble what 
she could give. So it was settled that they 
should be Joy’s gift. 

Gypsy was very pleasant about it, but Joy 
could not help seeing that she was disappointed. 
So then there came a little generous impulse to 
Joy too, and she came one day and said — 

“ Gypsy, don’t let’s divide the things off so, 
for Peace. It makes my part the largest. Be- 


164 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


sides, the worsteds look the prettiest. Let’s 
just give them together and have it all one.” 

There is a rare pleasure in making a gift 
one’s self, without being hampered by this ‘ ‘ all- 
together ” notion, isn’t there? — especially if 
the gift be a handsome one, and is going where 
it is very much needed. So as Joy sat fingering 
the pile of elegant worsteds, twining the bril- 
liant, soft folds of orange, and crimson, and 
royal purple, and soft, wood-browns about her 
hands, it cost her a bit of a struggle to say this. 
It seems rather a small thing to write about? 
Ah, they are these hits of struggles in which we 
learn to fight the great ones ; perhaps these bits 
of struggles, more than the great ones, make up 
life. 

“ You’re real good,” said Gypsy, surprised; 
“I think I’d rather not. It isn’t really half 
of it mine, and I don’t want to say so. But it’s 
just as good in you.” 

At that moment, though neither of them 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


165 


knew it was so, one thought was in the heart of 
both. It was a sudden thought that came and 
went, and left a great happiness in its place 
(for great happiness springs out of very little 
battles and victories) , — a memory of Peace 
Maythorne’s verse. The good Christmas time 
would have been a golden time to them, if it 
taught them in ever so small, imperfect ways, 
to prefer one another “ in honor.” 

One day before it came, a sudden notion 
seemed to strike Gypsy, and she rushed out of 
the house in her characteristic style, as if she 
were running for her life, and down to Peace 
Maythorne’s, and flew into the quiet room hke 
a tempest. 

“ Peace Maythorne, what’s your favorite 
verse ? ” 

“ Why, what a hurry you’re in ! Sit down 
and rest a minute.” 

“No, I can’t stop. I just want to know 
what your favorite verse is, as quick as ever you 
can be.” 


166 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


‘ ‘ Dkl you come down just for that ? How 
queer ! Well, let me see.” 

Peace stopped a minute, her quiet eyes look- 
ing off through the window, but seeming to see 
nothing, — away somewhere, Gypsy, even in her 
hurry stopped to wonder where. 

‘ ‘ I think — it isn’t one you’d care much 
about, perhaps — I think I like this. Yes, I 
think I canH help liking it best of all.” 

Peace touched her finger to a page of her 
Bible that lay open. Gypsy, bending over, 
read : — 

‘ ‘ And the inliabitant shall not say I am 
sick.” 

When she had read, she stooped and kissed 
Peace with a sudden kiss. 

From that time until Christmas, Gypsy was 
very busy in her own room with her paint-box, all 
the spare time she could find. On Christmas Eve 
she went down just after dusk to Peace May- 
thorne’s room, and called Miss Jane out into the 
entry. 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


167 


“ This is for Peace, and I made it. I don’t 
want her to see a thing about it till she wakes 
up in the morning. Could you please to fasten 
it up on the wall just opposite the bed where 
the sun shines in? sometime after she’s gone to 
sleep, you know.” 

^ ’ Miss Jane, somewhat bewildered, took the 
thing that Gypsy held out to her, and held it up 
in the light that fell from a neighbor’s half-open 
door. 

It was a large illuminated text, painted on 
Bristol board of a soft grey shade, and very 
well done for a non-professional artist. The 
letters were of that exquisite shade known by 
artists as smalt blue, edged heavily with gold, 
and around them a border of yellow, delicate 
sprays of wheat. Miss Jane spelled out in the 
German text : — 

♦♦ tl)e sijall not aaj K am 

“ Well, thank you. I’ll put it up. Peace 


168 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


never gets to sleep till terrible late, and I’m 
rather wore out with work to lie awake waitin’ 
till she is. But then, if you want to surprise 
her — I s’pose she will be dreadful tickled, — I 
guess I’ll manage it someways.” 

Perhaps Miss Jane was softened into being 
obliging by her coming holicfey ; or perhaps the 
mournful, longing words touched something in 
her that nothing touched very often. 

Gypsy and Joy were not so old but that 
Christmas Eve with its little plans for the mor- 
row held yet a certain shade of that delightful 
suspense and mystery which perhaps never hangs 
about the greater and graver joys of life. I 
fancy we drink it to the full, in the hanging up 
of stockings, the peering out into the dark to 
see Santa Claus come down the chimney (per- 
fectly conscious that that gentleman is the most 
transparent of hoaxes, but with a sort of faith 
in him all the while ; we may see him if we can 
lie awake long enough, — who knows?) the 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


169 


falling asleep before we know it, and much 
against our will, the waking in the cold, gray, 
mysterious dawn, and pattering about barefoot 
to ‘ ‘ catch ” the dreaming and defenceless fam- 

iiy- 

“ I’m going to lie awake all night,” Gypsy 
announced, as she stood brushing out her bright, 
black hair; “then I’ll catch you, you see if I 
don’t.” 

“ But I’m going to lie awake, too,” said Joy. 
I was going to last Christmas, only — I didn’t.” 

“ Sit up and see the sun dance, like Patty.” 

“Well, let’s. I never was awake all night 
in my whole life.” 

“ Nor I,” said Gypsy. “ I came pretty near 
it once, but I somehow went to sleep along at 
the end.” 

‘ ‘ When was that ? ” 

“Why, one time I had a dream, and went 
clear over to the Kleiner Berg Basin in my 
sleep, and got into the boat.” 

15 


170 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ You did ! ” 

“ I. guess I did. The boat was unlocked and 
the oars were up at the barn, and so I floated 
oflp, and there I had to stay till Tom came in the 

morninor.” 

O 

‘ ‘ Why, I should have been scared out of my 
seventeen senses,” said Joy, creeping into bed ; 
‘ ‘ didn’t you scream ? ” 

“No. That wouldn’t have done any good. 
See here, Joy ; if you find me going to sleep, 
pinch me, will you?” 

“Oh, yes,” said Joy, with alacrity. “I 
shall be awake, I know.” 

There was a silence. Gypsy broke it by 
turning her head over on the pillow with a 
whisk, and opening her eyes savagely, quite 
mdignant to find them shut. 

“Joy.” 

No answer. 

“Joy, you’re going — ” 

Joy’s head turned over with another whisk. 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


171 


“]N^o, I’m not. I’m just as wide awake as 
ever I was.” 

Another silence. 

“ Gypsy ! ” 

Gypsy jumped. 

“ YoiCre going to sleep.” 

“ It isn’t any such a tiling,” said Gypsy, sit- 
ting up and rubbing her eyes. 

“I wonder if it isn’t most morning,” said 
Joy, in a tone of cheerful indifference. 

‘ ‘ Most morning ! Mother ’d say we’d been 
in bed just ten minutes, I suppose.” 

Joy stifled a groan, and by dint of great 
exertions, turned it into a laugh. 

“All the longer to lie awake. It’s nice, 
isn’t it ? ” 

“ Ye-es. Let’s talk. People that sit up all 
night talk, I guess.” 

“ Well, I guess it would be a good plan. 
You begin.” 

“ I don’t know anything to say.” 


172 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ Well, I’m sure I don’t.” 

Silence again. 

“Joy Breynton.” 

“ We-ell?” 

‘ ‘ I guess I’ll keep awake just as well if I — 
shut up — my eyes. Don’t you — ” 

That was the end of Gypsy’s sentence, and 
Joy never asked for the rest of it. Just about 
an hour and a half after, Gypsy heard a noise, 
and was somewhat surprised to see J oy standing 
up with her head in the wash-bowl. 

‘ ‘ What are you doing ? ” 

“ Oh, just dipping my head into the water. 
They say it helps keep people awake.” 

“Oh — well. See here; we haven’t talked 
much lately, have we?” 

“No. I thought I wouldn’t disturb you.” 

Gypsy made a ghastly attempt to answer, but 
couldn’t quite do it. 

At the end of another indefinite period, Joy 
opened her eyes under the remarkable impression 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 173 

that Oliver Cromwell was carrying her to the 
guillotine in a cocoa-nut shell ; it was really a 
very remarkable impression, considering that she 
had been broad awake ever since she came to bed. 
As soon as her eyes were open, she opened her 
mouth likewise — to gasp out a little scream. 
For something very tall and white was sitting 
up on the bed-post with folded arms. 

‘ ‘ Why Gypsy Breynton ! ” 

“What?” 

‘ ‘ What are you up there for ? ” 

“ Got up so ’s to keep awake. It’s real 
fun.” 

“Why, how your teeth chatter. Isn’t it 
cold up there ? ” 

“ Ka-ther. I don’t know but I might as well 
come down.” 

‘ ‘ I wonder,” muttered Gypsy, drowsily, just 
as Joy had begun in very thrilling words to 
request Oliver Cromwell to have mercy on her, 
and was about preparing to jump out of the 


15 * 


174 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


cocoa-nut shell into Niagara Falls, “ I wonder 
what makes people think it’s a joke to lie 
awake.” 

“I don’t believe they do,” said Joy, with a 
tinge in her voice of something that, to say the 
least, was not hilarious. 

“ Yes they do,” persisted Gypsy; “all the 
girls in novels lie awake all night and cry when 
their lovers go to Europe, and they have a real 
nice time. Only it’s most always moonlight, 
and they talk out loud. I always thought when 
I got large enough to have a lover, I’d try it.”* 
Joy dropped into another dream, and, though 
not of interest to the public, it was a very 
charming dream, and she felt decidedly cross, 
when, at the end of another unknown period, 
Gypsy woke her up with a pinch. 

“ Merry Christmas ! Merry Christmas ! ” 
“What are you merry Christmassing for? 
That’s no fair. It isn’t morning yet. Let me 
alone.” 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


175 


“ Yes, it is morning too. I heard the clock 
strike six ever so long ago. Get up and build 
the fire.’’ 

“I don’t believe it’s morning. You can 
build it yourself.” 

“No, it’s your week. Besides, you made 
me do it twice for you your last turn, and I 
shan’t touch it. Besides, it is morning.” 

Joy rose with a groan, and began to fumble 
for the matches. All at once Gypsy heard a 
a very fervent exclamation. 

‘ ‘ What’s the matter ? ” 

“The old thing’s tipped over, — every sin- 
gle, solitary match ! ” 

Gypsy began to laugh. 

“ It’s nothing to laugh at,” chattered Joy ; 
“ I’m frozen almost to death, and this horjid old 
fire won’t do a thing but smoke.” 

Gypsy, curled up in the warm bed, smoth- 
ered her laugh as best she could, to see Joy 
crouched shivering before the stove-door, blow- 


176 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


ing away frantically at the fire, her cheeks 
puffed out, her hands blue as indigo. 

“ There ! ” said Joy, at last ; “I shan’t work 
any more over it. It may go out if it wants 
to, and if it don’t it needn’t.” 

She came back to bed, and the fire muttered 
and sputtered a while, and died out, and shot 
up again, and at last made up its mind to bum, 
and burned like a small volcano. 

“ What a noise that fire makes ! I hope it 
won’t wake up mother. Joy, doesn’t it strike 
you as rather funny it doesn’t grow light 
faster ? ” 

“ I don’t know.” 

‘ ‘ Get up and look at the entry clock ; you’re 
on the front side.” 

Poor Joy jumped out shivering into the cold 
again, opened the door softly, and ran out. 
She came back in somewhat of a hurry, and 
shut the door with a bang. 

“ Gypsy Breynton 1 ” 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


177 


“What?” 

“ If I ever forgive you ! ” 

“ What is the matter? ” 

“ It’s just twenty-five minutes past eleven ! ” 
Gypsy broke into a ringing laugh, Joy 
could nev^r bear to be laughed at. 

“ I don’t see anything so terribly funny, and 
I guess you wouldn’t if you’d made that old — ” 
“Fire; I know it. Just to think! — and 
you sliivering and blowing away at it. I never 
heard an}i;hing so funny ! ” 

‘ ‘ I think it was real mean in you to wake^ me 
up, any way.” 

“ Why, I thought I heard it strike six as 
much as could be. Oh, dear, oh, dear ! ” 

Joy couldn’t see the joke. But the story of 
that memorable night was not yet finished. 

The faint, gray morning really came at last, 
and the girls awoke in good earnest, ready and 
glad to get up. 

‘ ‘ I feel as if I’d been pulled through a knot- 
hole.” “'‘id Joy. 


178 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


‘ ‘ I slept with one eye open all the time I did 
sleep,” said Gypsy, drearily. “I know one 
thing. I’ll never try to lie awake again as long 
as I live.” 

“Not when you have a lover go to Europe ? ” 
“ Not if I have a dozen lovers go to Europe. 
How is that fire going to be built, I’d like to 
know ? — every stick of wood burned out last 
night.” 

There was no way but to go' down into the 
wood-shed and get some. It was yet early, and 
quite dark. 

“Go the back stairs,” said Gypsy, “ so ’s 
not to wake people up.” 

Joy opened the door, and jumped, with a 
scream that echoed through the silent entry. 

‘ ‘ Hush-sh ! What is the matter ? ” 

“A — a — it’s a ghost ! ” 

“ A ghost ! Nonsense ! ” 

Gypsy pushed by trembling Joy and ran out. 
She, too, came back with a jump, and, though 
she did not scream, she did not say nonsense. 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


179 


‘ ‘ What can it be ? ” 

It certainly did look amazingly like a ghost. 
Something tall and white and ghastly, with 
awful arm extended. The entry was very dark. 

Joy sprang into bed and covered up her face 
in the clothes. Gypsy stood still and winked 
fast for about a minute. Then Joy heard a faU 
and a bubbling laush. 

‘ ‘ That old Tom ! It’s nothing but a broom- 
handle and a sheet. Oh, Joy, just come and 
see ! ” 

After that, Joy declared she wouldn’t go to 
the wood-shed alone, if she dressed without a 
fire the rest of her life. So Gypsy started with 
her, and they crept down stairs on tiptoe, hold- 
ing their very breath in their efforts to be still, 
the stairs creaking at every step. Did you ever 
•pariicularlij want stairs to keep still, that they 
didn’t creak like thunder-claps ? 

The girls managed to get into the wood-shed, 
fill their basket, and steal back into the kitchen 


180 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


without mishap. Then came the somewhat 
dubious undertaking of erawling up-stairs in 
darkness that might be felt, with a heavy and 
decidedly uncertain load of wood. 

“ I’ll go first and carry the basket,” said 
Gypsy. “ One can do it easier than two.” 

So she began to feel her way slowly up. 

“ It’s black as Egypt ! Joy, why don’t you 
come ? ” 

‘ ‘ I’m caught on something — oh ! ” Down 
fell something with an awful crash that echoed 
and reechoed, and resounded through the sleep- 
ing house. It was succeeded by an utter si- 
lence. 

“ What is it? ” breathed Gypsy, faintly. 

“The clothes-horse, and every one of Pattfs 
clean clothes ! ” 

Scarcely were the words off from Joy’s lips, 
when Gypsy, sitting down on the stairs to 
laugh, tipped over her basket, and every solitary 
stick of that wood clattered down the uncarpeted 


THE STORY OF A NIGHT. 


181 


stairs, thumped through the banisters, bounced 
on the floor, rolled into the corners, thundered 
against the cellar door. I don’t believe you 
ever heard such a noise in all your life. 

Mr. and Mrs. Breynton ran from one direc- 
tion, Tom from another, Winnie from a third, 
and Patty screaming in fearful dishabille from 
the attic, and the congress that assembled in 
that entry where sat Gypsy speechless on one 
stair, and Joy on another, the power fails me 
to describe. 

But this was the end of that Christmas 
night. 

It should be recorded that the five-dollar bill 
and the portfolio with purple roses on it were 
both forthcoming that day, and that Gypsy 
entirely forgot any difference between her own 
little gifts and Joy’s. This was partly because 
she had somehow learned to be glad in the dif- 
ference, if it pleased Joy; partly because of a 
certain look in her mother’s eyes when she saw 


182 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


the picture-frame. Such a look made Gypsy 
happy for days together. 

That Christmas was as merry as Christmas 
can be, but the best part of it all was the sight 
of Peace Maythorne’s face as she lay twining 
the gorgeous worsteds over her thin fingers, the 
happy sunlight touching their colors of crimson, 
and royal purple, and orange, and woodland 
brown, just as kindly as it was touching the 
new Christmas jewels over which many another 
young girl in many another home sat laughing 
that morning. 

But Gypsy long remembered — she remem- 
bers now with dim eyes and quivering smile — 
how Peace drew her face down softly on the 
pillow, pointing to the blue and golden words 
upon the wall, and said in a whisper that nobody 
else heard — 

“That is best of all. Oh, Gypsy, when I 
woke up in the morning and found it I ” 


CHAPTEE IX. 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 

f SHOULD think we might, I’m sure,” 
said Joy pausing, with a crisp bit of hali- 

f but on her fork, just midway between her 
plate and her lips. 

“You needn’t shake your head so. Mother 
Breynton,” said Gypsy, her great brown eyes 
pleading over her tea-cup with their very most 
irresistible twinkle. “ Now it isn’t the slightest 
trouble to say yes, and you can just as well say 
it now as any other time, you know.” 

“ But it really seems to me a little dangerous, 
Gypsy, — up over those mountain roads on 
livery stable horses.” 

“ But Tom says it isn’t a bit dangerous, and 


183 


184 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Tom’s been up it forty times. Rattlesnake has 
the best roads of any of the mountains round 
here, and there are fences by all the precipices, 
Tom said, didn’t you, Tom?” 

“No,” said Tom, coolly. “There isn’t a 
fence. There are logs in some places, and in 
some there aren’t.” 

“ Oh, what a bother you are ! Well, any 
way it’s all the same, and I’m not a bit afraid 
of stable horses. I can manage any of them, 
from Mr. Burt’s iron-gray colt down,” which was 
true enough. Gypsy was used to riding, and 
perfectly fearless. 

“ But Joy hasn’t ridden much, and I should 
never forgive myself if any accident happened 
to her while her father is gone.” 

“Joy can ride Billy. There isn’t a cow in 
Yorkbury safer.” 

Mrs. Breynton sipped her tea and thought 
about it. 

“ I want to go horse-bacldng, too,” put in 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 


185 


Winnie, glaring savagely at Gypsy over his 
bread and milk. “ I’m five years old.” 

“ And jerked six whole buttons oif your 
jacket this very day,” said Gypsy, eyeing 
certain gaps of which there were always more 
or less to be seen in Winnie’s attire in spite of 
his mother’s care. “A boy who jerks buttons 
like that couldn’t go ‘ horse-backing.’ You 
wouldn’t have one left by the time you came 
home, — look out, you’ll have your milk over. 
You tipped it over times enough this morning 
for one day.” 

“You will have your milk over ; don’t stand 
the mug up on the napkin-ring, — no, nor on 
that crust of bread, either,” repeated his 
mother, and everybody looked up anxiously, 
and edged away a little from Winnie’s immedi- 
ate vicinity. This young gentleman had a 
pleasing little custom of deluging the united 
family at meal-time, at least once regularly 
every day, with milk and bread-crumbs ; mater- 


186 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


nal and paternal injunctions, threats, and pun- 
ishments notwithstanding, he contrived every 
day some perfectly novel, ingenious, and totally 
unexpected method of accomplishing the same ; 
uniting, in his efforts, the strategy of a Napo- 
leon, with the unruffled composure of a Grant. 

“ I don’t know but what I’ll see what father 
thinks about it,” Mrs. Breynton went on 
thoughtfully. “ If he should be willing — ” 

“ Good, good! ” cried Gypsy, clapping her 
hands. “ Father’s in the library. Winnie, 
you run up and ask him if we can’t go up Rat- 
tlesnake.” 

“Well,” said Winnie, “when I just get 
through eatin’. I’m goin’ to make him let me 
horseback as much as you or anybody else.” 

Winnie finished his toast with imperturbable 
deliberation, pushed back his chair, and jumped 
up. 

Splash ! went a shower of milk all over him, 
his mother, the table, and the carpet. Every- 


UP EATTLESNAKE. 


187 


body jumped. Winnie gasped and stood drip- 
ping. 

‘ ‘ Oh-ob ! how did he do it ? Why, Winnie 
Breynton ! ” 

For there hung the mug from his waist, 
empty, upside down, tied to his bib, 

“In a hard knot, if you’ll believe it! I 
never saw such a child in all my life I Why 
Winnie ! ” 

The utter blankness of astonishment that 
crept over Winnie’s face when he looked down 
and saw the mug hanging, Mr. Darley might 
have made a small fortune out of ; but the pen 
of a Cicero could not attempt it. It appeared 
to be one of those cases when ‘ ‘ the heart feels 
most though the lips move not.” 

“ What did you do such a thing for? 'What 
could possess you ? ” 

“Oh,” said Winnie, very red in the face, 
“ it’s there, is it? I was a steamboat, and the 
mug was my stove-pipe, ’n then I forgot. I 


188 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


want a clean apron. I don’t want any milk to- 
morrer.” 

This was in the early summer. The holidays 
had come and gone, and the winter and the 
spring. Coasting, skating, and snowballing 
had given place to driving hoop, picking flowers, 
boating, and dignified promenades on the fash- 
ionable pavement down town ; furs and bright 
woollen hoods, tippets, mittens, and rubber- 
boots were exchanged for calico dresses, com- 
fortable, brown, bare hands, and jaunty straw 
hats with feathers on them. On the whole, it 
had been a pleasant winter : times there had 
been, when Gypsy heartily wished Joy had 
never come, when Joy heartily wished she were 
at home ; certain little jealousies there had been, 
selfish thoughts, unkind acts, angry words ; but 
many penitent hours as well, some confessions, 
the one to the other, that nobody else heard, 
and a certain faint, growing interest in each 
other. Strictly speaking, they did not very 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 


189 


much love each other yet, but they were not far 
from it. “I am getting used to Joy,” said 
Gypsy. ‘ ‘ I like Gypsy ever so much better 
than I did once,” Joy wrote to her father. One 
thing they had learned that winter. Every gen- 
erous deed, every thoughtful word, narrowed 
the distance between them ; each one wiped out 
the ugly memory of some past impatience, some 
past unkindness. And now something was 
about to happen that should bring them nearer 
to each other than anything had done yet. 

That June night on which they sat at the tea- 
table discussing the excursion up Eattlesnake, 
was the beginning of it. When Winnie was 
sufficiently mopped up to admit of his locomo- 
tion about the house with any safety to the car- 
pets, he was dispatched to the library on the 
errand to his father. What with various wire- 
pullings of Gypsy’s, and arguments from Tom, 
the result was that Mr. Breynton gave his con- 
sent to the plan, on condition that the young 
people would submit to his accompanying them. 


190 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ That’s perfectly splend,” cried Gypsy ; “all 
the better for having you. Only, my best 
beloved of fathers, you mustn’t keep saying, 
‘ Gypsy, Gypsy, be careful,’ you know, every 
time my horse jumps, because if you should, 
I’m very much afraid.” 

‘ ‘ Afraid of what ? ” 

“ That Gypsy wouldn’t be careful,” said the 
young lady, folding her hands demurely. Her 
father attempted to call her a sauce-box, but 
Gypsy jumped upon his knee, and pulled his 
whiskers till he cried out for mercy, and gave 
her a kiss instead. 

There was an undercurrent of reality in the 
fun, however. Mr. Breynton’s over-anxiety — 
fussiness, some people would have called it — 
his children were perfectly conscious of ; chil- 
dren are apt to be the first to discover their 
parents’ faults and weaknesses. Gypsy loved 
her father dearly, but she somehow always felt 
as if he must be managed. 

So it came about that on a certain royal June 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 


191 


day, a merry party started for a horseback ride 
up Rattlesnake mountain. 

“ IVe a good mind to take my waterproof,” 
said J oy , as they were starting ; “we may not 
be back till late, and you know how cold it 
grows by the river after dark.” 

“Nonsense!” laughed Gypsy; “why, the 
thermometer’s 80 ^^ already.” 

Nevertheless, Joy went back and got the 
waterproof. She afterwards had occasion to be 
very glad of it. 

The party consisted of Mr. Breynton, Tom, 
Joy, Gypsy, Mr. and Mrs. Hallam (this was 
the Mrs. Hallam who had once been Gypsy’s 
teacher) , Sarah Rowe, and her brother Francis, 
who was home from college on account of ill 
health, he said. Tom always coughed and 
arched his eyebrows in a very peculiar way 
wdien this was mentioned, but Gypsy could 
never find out what he did it for. 

The day, as I said, was royal. The sky, the 


192 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


river, the delicate golden green of the young 
leaves and grass, the lights and shadows on the 
distant mountains, all were mellowed in together 
like one of Church’s pictures ; and there was 
one of those spicy winds that Gypsy always 
described by saying that “ the angels had been 
showering great bottles of fresh cologne-water 
into them.” 

The young people felt these things in a sort 
of dreamy, unconscious way, but, they were too 
busy and too merry to notice them in detail. 

Joy was mounted safely on demure Billy, 
and Gypsy rode — not Mr. Burt’s iron-gray, 
for Tom claimed that, — but a free, though 
manageable pony, with just the arch of the 
neck, toss of the mane, and coquettish lifting 
of the feet that she particularly fancied. The 
rest were variously mounted ; Francis Bowe 
rode a fiery colt that his father had just bought, 
and the like of which was not to be seen in 
Yorkbury. 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 


193 


Up — up, winding on and away, through 
odors of fragrant pines and unseen flowers, 
under the soft, green shadows, through the yel- 
low lights. How beautiful, — how beautiful it 
was ! 

‘ ‘ Who’ll race with me ? ” inquired Mr. 
Francis Rowe suddenly. ‘ ‘ I call it an uncom- 
mon bore, this doing nothing but looking at the 
trees. I say, Breynton, the slope’s easy here 
for a quarter of a mile ; come ahead.” 

“ No, thank you ; I don’t approve of racing 
up mountains.” 

Tom might have said he didn’t approve of 
being beaten ; the iron-gray was no match for 
the colt, and he knew it. 

“ Who’ll race ? ” persisted Mr. Francis, im- 
patiently ; ‘ ‘ isn’t there anybody ? ” 

“ I will,” said Gypsy, seriously enough. 

“ You ! ” said Tom ; “ why, the colt would 
leave that bay mare out of sight before you 

could say Jack Robinson.” 

13 


194 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ Oh, I don’t expect to beat. Of course 
that’s out of the question. But I should like 
the run ; where’s the goal, Francis? ” 

“ That turn in the road where the tall fir- 
tree is, with those dead limbs ; you see?” 

“Yes. We’ll trot, of course. All ready.” 

“ Be very careful, Gypsy,” called her father, 
nervously ; ‘ ‘ I’m really almost afraid to have 
you go. You might come to the precipice 
sooner than you expect, and then the horse may 
shy.” 

“I’ll be careful, father; — come, Nelly, 
gently, — whe-ee ! ” 

Suddenly reflecting that it was not supposed 
to be ladylike to whistle, Gypsy drew her lips 
into a demure pucker, touched Nelly with the 
tassel of her whip, and flew away up the hill on 
a brisk trot. Mr. Francis condescendingly 
checked the full speed of the colt, and they rode 
on pretty nearly side by side. 

“ I’m afraid, in justice to my horse, I must 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 


195 


really come in first,” began Mr. Francis, loosen- 
ing his rein as they neared the fir-tree. 

“ Oh, of course,” said Gypsy, with a twinkle 
in her eyes ; “I didn’t undertake to beat.” 

Now Nelly had a trick with which Gypsy was 
perfectly familiar, of breaking into a run at an 
instant’s notice, if she were pinched in a certain 
spot on her neck. Suddenly, while the colt 
was springing on in his fleet trot, and Mr. 
Francis supposed Gypsy was a full eight feet 
behind, he was utterly confounded to see her 
flying past him on a bounding gallop, her hair 
tossing in the wind, her cheeks scarlet, her eyes 
triumphant. 

But right in the middle of the road, between 
them and the fir-tree, w^as something neither of 
them had seen ; — a huge tree just fallen, with 
its high, prickly branches on. 

“Jerusalem!” said Mr. Francis, under his 
breath, as the colt pricked up his ears omin- 
ously. 


196 


GYroi S COUSIN JOY. 


“Oh, good! here’s a jump,” cried Gypsy, 
and over it she went at a bound. The colt 
reared and shied, and planting his dainty fore- 
feet firmly on the ground, refused to stir an 
inch. Gypsy whirled around and stood tri- 
umphant under the fir-tree, her eyes snapping 
merrily. 

“ Why, how did this ever happen? ” cried the 
rest, as they came laughing up. 

“I say, there’s some witchcraft about this 
business,” remarked Mr. Francis, quite bewil- 
dered ; ‘ ‘ wait till I’ve cleared off these 

branches, and we’ll try that over again.” 

“ Very well,” said Gypsy, in a perfect whirl 
of excitement and delight, as she always was, 
with anything in the shape of reins in her hand. 
But just then she looked back and saw Joy 
toiling on slowly behind the others ; Billy with 
his head hanging and his spirits quite gone. 
Gypsy stopped a moment as if in thought, and 
then rode slowly down the hiU. 



Gypsy's Race with Mr. Francis. Page 196 . 





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UP RATTLESNAKE. 


197 


“ I’m having a horrid time,” said Joy discon* 
solately, as she came up ; “ Billy is as stupid as 
a mule, and won’t go.” 

“ I’m real sorry,” said Gypsy, slowly ; “ you 
might have Nelly. We’ll change awhile.” 

‘‘No,” said Joy, “I’m afraid of Nelly. 
Besides, you wouldn’t like Billy any better than 
I do. It’s dreadfully stupid back here alone, 
though. I wish I hadn’t come.” 

“Francis,” called Gypsy, “I guess I wont 
race. I’m going to ride with Joy awhile.” 

“Why, you needn’t do that!” said Joy, 
rather ashamed of her complaining. But 
Gypsy did do it ; and though her face had 
clouded for the moment, a sunbeam broke over 
it then that lasted the rest of the day. 

The day passed very much like other picnics. 
They stopped in a broad, level place on the 
summit of the mountain, tied the horses where 
they could graze on the long, tufted wood- grass, 
unpacked the dinner-baskets, and devoted them- 


^ 198 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


selves to biscuit and cold tongue, tarts, lemon- 
ade and currant wine, through the lazj, golden 
nooning. 

It was voted that they should not attempt the 
long, hot ride down the mountain-side, until the 
blaze of the afternoon sun shoidd be somewhat 
cooled. So, after dinner they went their several 
ways, finding amusement for the sultry hours. 
Mr. Breynton and Tom went off on a hunt 
after a good place to water the horses ; Francis 
Rowe betook himself to a cigar ; Sarah curled 
herself up on the soft moss with her sack for a 
pillow, and went to sleep ; Mr. and Mrs. Hal- 
1am sat under the trees and read Tennyson to 
each other. 

“ IIow terribly stupid that must be,” said 
Gypsy, looking on in supreme disgust; “let’s 
you and I go off. I know a place where there 
used to be some splendid foxberry blossoms, 
lots of ’em, real pretty ; they looked just as if 
they were snipped out of pearls with a pair of 
sharp scissors.” 


up RATTLESNAKE. 


199 


“ I wouldn’t go out of sight of us all,” 
called Mr. Breynton, as the two girls roamed 
away together among the trees. 

“ But you are most out of sight now,” said 
Joy, presently. 

“ Oh, he didn’t say we mustn't , answered 
Gypsy. “ He didn’t mean we mustn’t, either. 
Father always worries so.” 

It would have been well for Gypsy if her 
father’s wish had been to her what her mother’s 
was, — as binding as a command. 

“Just think,” observed Gypsy, as they 
strolled on through the fallen leaves and red- cup 
mosses, “just think of their sitting still and 
reading poetry on a picnic I I can’t get over it. 
Miss Melville didn’t used to do such stupid 
things. It’s just ’cause she’s married.” 

“ How do you know but you’ll do just the 
same some day ? ” 

‘ ‘ Catch me ! I’m not going to be married 
at all.” 


200 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“Not going to be married! Why, I am, 
and I’m going to have a wliite velvet dress, 
too.” 

“ Well, you may. But I wouldn’t for a 
whole trunkful of white velvet dresses, — no, I 
wouldn’t for two dozen trunkfuls. I’m not 
going to stay at home and keep house, and look 
sober, with my hair done up behind. I’d rather 
be an old maid, and have a pony, and run 
round in the woods.” 

“ Why, I never saw such a girl I ” exclaimed 
Joy, opening her small eyes wide ; “I wouldn’t 
be an old maid for anything. I’m going to be 
married in St. Paul’s, and I’m going to have my 
dress all caught up with orange-buds, and 
spangles on my veil. Therese and I, we 
planned it all out one night, — Therese used to 
be my French nurse, you know.” 

For answer, Gypsy threw herself down sud- 
denly on the velvet moss, her eyes turned up 
to the far, hazy sky, showing in patches through 
a lace- work of thousands of leaves. 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 


201 


“Joy,” she said, breaking a silence, and 
speaking in a curious, earnest tone Gypsy sel- 
dom used, “ I do really, though, sometimes go 
off alone where there are some trees, and 
wonder.” 

‘ ‘ W onder what ? ” 

“ What in this world I was ever made for. 
1 suppose there’s got to be a reason.” 

“ A reason ! ” said Joy, blankly. 

“ There’s got to be something done, for all I 
see. God doesn’t make people live on and on 
and die, for nothing. One can’t be a little girl 
all one’s life, climbing trees and making snow- 
balls,” said Gypsy, half dreamily, half impa- 
tiently, jumping up and walking on. 

So they wandered away and away, deeper 
into the heart of the forest, through moss and 
tufted grasses, and tangles of mountain flowers, 
chatting as girls will, in their silly, merry way, 
with now and then a flash of graver thought 
like this of Gypsy’s. 


202 


gypsy’s cousin JOY". 


“ You’re sure you know the way back,” said 
Joy, presently. 

Oh, yes; I’ve been over it forty times. 
We’ve turned about a good many times, but I 
don’t think we’ve gone very far from the top of 
the mountain.” 

So, deeper, and further, and on, where the 
breath of the pines was sweet ; where hidden 
blossoms were folding their cups for the night, 
and the shadows in the thickets were throwing 

O O 

gray. 

“ Gypsy ! ” said Joy, suddenly, “ we’re cer- 
tainly going down 

“So we are,” said Gypsy, thoughtfully; 
“ it’s getting dark, too. They’ll be ready to 
start for home. I guess we’ll go back now.” 

They turned then, and began rapidly to 
retrace their steps, over brambles and stones and 
fallen trees ; through thickets, and up projecting 
rocks, — very rapidly. 

“ It is growing dark,” said Gypsy, half under 


UP RATTLESNAKE. 


203 


her breath ; “ why didn’t we find it out before?” 

“ Gypsy,” said Joy, after a silence, “ do you 
remember that knot of white birches? I don’t.” 

Gypsy stopped and looked around. 

“ N-no, I don’t know as I do. But I dare 
say we saw them and forgot. Let’s walk a 
little faster.” 

They walked a little faster. They walked 
quite as fast as they could go. 

‘‘ See that great pile of rock,” said Joy, 
presently, her voice trembling a little ; “ I know 
we didn’t come by that before. It looks as if 
there were a precipice off there.” 

Gypsy made no answer. She was looking 
keenly around, her eyes falling on every rock, 
stump, tree, and flower, in search of the tiny, 
trodden path by which they had left the summit 
of the mountain. But there was no path. 
Only the bramble, and the grass, and the tangled 
thickets. 

It was now very dark. 


204 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ I guess this is the way,” spoke up Gypsy, 
cheerfully, — “here. Take hold of my hand, 
Joy, and we’ll run. I think I know where the 
path is. We had turned off from it a little 
bit.” 

Joy took her hand, and they ran on together. 
It grew darker, and grew darker. They could 
scarcely see the sky now, and the brambles 
grew high and thick and strange. 

Suddenly Gypsy stopped, knee-deep in a jun- 
gle of blackberry bushes. 

“Joy, I’m — afraid I don’t — know the — 


CHAPTER X. 


WE ARE LOST I 


« HE two girls, still clasping hands, looked 
into each other’s eyes. Gypsy was 



very pale. 

‘ ‘ Then we are lost ! ” 


“ Yes.” 


“ And it’s so dark ! ” 

Joy broke into a sort of sobbing cry. •Gypsy 
squeezed her hand very tightly, with quivering 
lips. 

“ It’s all my fault. I thought I knew. Oh, 
Joy, I’m so sorry ! ” 

She expected Joy to burst forth in a torrent 
of reproaches ; once it would have been so ; but 
for some reason, Joy did not say an angry word. 


( 205 ) 



206 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


She only sobbed away quietly, clutching at 
Gypsy’s hand as if she were very much fright- 
ened. She was frightened thoroughly. The 
scene was enough to terrify a far less timid child 
than Joy. 

It was now quite dark. Over in the west, a 
faint, ghostly gleam of light still lingered, seen 
dimly through the trees ; but it only made the 
utter blackness of the great forest-shadows more 
horrible. The huge trunks of the pines and 
maples towered up, up — they could scarcely 
see how far, grim, and gloomy, and silent ; here 
and there a dead branch thrust itself out against 
the sky, in that hideous likeness to a fleshless 
hand which night and darkness always lend to 
them. Even Gypsy, though she had been in 
the woods many times at night before, shud- 
dered as she stood looking up. A queer thought 
came to her, of an old fable she had sometime 
read m Tom’s mythology ; a fable of some huge 
Titans, angry and fierce, who tried to climb 


WE ARE LOST ! 


207 


info heaven : there was just that look about the 
trees. It was very still. The birds were in 
their nests, their singing done. From far away 
in some distant swamp came the monotonous, 
mournful chant of the frogs, — a dreary sound 
enough, heard in a safe and warm and lighted 
home ; unspeakably ugly if one is lost in a deso- 
late forest. _ 

WSIm 

Now and then a startled squirrel dropped 
from bough to bough ; or there was the stealthy, 
sickening rustle of an unseen snake among the 
fallen leaves. From somewhere, too, where 
precipices that they could not find dashed 
downwards into damp gullies, cold, clinging 
mists were rising. 

“To stay here all night!” sobbed Joy, 
“ Oh, Gypsy, Gypsy I ” 

Gypsy was a brave, sensible girl, and after 
that first moment of horror when she stood 
looking up at the trees, her courage and her 
wits came back to her. 


208 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“I don’t believe we shall have to stay here 
all night,” speaking in a decided, womanly way, 
a little of the way her mother had, in a diflS- 
culty. 

‘ ‘ They are all over the mountain hunting for 
us now. They’ll find us before long, I know. 
Besides, if they didn’t, we could sit down in a 
dry place somewhere, and wait till morning ; 
there wouldn’t anything hurt us. Oh, you 
b. Qught your waterproof — good ! Put it on 
and button it up tight.” 

Joy had the cloak folded over her arm. She 
did passively as Gypsy told her. When it was 
all buttoned, she suddenly remembered that 
Gypsy wore only her thin, nankeen sack, and 
she offered to share it with her. 

“ No,” said G3rpsy, “ I don’t want it. Wrap 
it around your throat as warm as you can. I 
got you into this scrape, and now I’m going to 
take care of you. Now let’s holloa.” 

And holloa they did, to the best of their 


WE ARE LOST I 


209 


ability ; Joy in her feeble, frightened way , 
Gypsy in loud shouts, and strong, like a boy’s. 
But there was no answer. They called again 
and again ; they stopped after each cry, with 
breath held in, and head bent to listen. Nothing 
was to be heard but the frogs and the squirrels 
and the gliding snakes. 

Joy broke out into fresh sobs. 

“ Well, it’s no use to stand here any longer,*' 
said Gypsy ; ‘ ‘ let’s run on.” 

“ Run where? You don’t know which way. 
What shall we do, what shall we do? ” 

“ We’ll go this way, — we haven’t tried it at 
all. I shouldn’t wonder a bit if the path were 
right over there where it looks so black. Be- 
sides, we shall hear them calling for us.” 

Ah, if tliere had been anybody to tell them ! 
In precisely the other direction, the picnic party, 
roused and frightened, were searching every 
thicket, and shouting their names at every 


14 


210 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


ravine. Each step the girls took now sent 
them so much further away from help. 

While they were running on, still hand in 
hand, Joy heard the most remarkable sound. 
It was a laugh from Gypsy, — actually a soft, 
merry laugh, breaking out like music on the 
night air, in the dreary place. 

“Why, Gypsy Breynton ! What can you 
find to laugh at, I should like to know ? ” said 
Joy, provoked enough to stop crying at very 
short notice. 

“ Oh, dear, I really can’t help it,” apologized 
Gypsy, choking down the offending mirth ; 
“ but I was thinking — I couldn’t help it, Joy, 
now, possibly — how mad Francis Kowe will 
be to think he’s got to stop and help hunt 
us up ! ” 

‘ ‘ I wonder what that black thing is ahead 
of us,” said Joy, presently. They were still 
running on together, but their hands were not 
joined just at that moment. Joy was a little in 
advance. 


WE ARE LOST ! 


211 


“ I’m sure I don’t know,” said Gypsy eyeing 
it intently. The words were scarcely off from 
her lips before she cried out with a loud cry, 
and sprang forward, clutching at Joy’s dress. 

She was too late. 

Joy tripped over a mass of briars, fell, rolled 
heavily, — not over upon the ground, but off. 
Off into horrible, utter darkness. Down, with 
outstretched hands and one long shriek. 

Gypsy stood as if some one had charmed her 
into a marble statue, her hands thrown above 
her head, her eyes peering into the blank dark- 
ness below. 

She stood so for one instant only ; then she 
did what only wild, impulsive Gypsy would 
have done. She went directly down after Joy, 
clino-inir with her hands and feet to the side of 
the clilF; slipping, rolling, getting to her feet 
again, tearing her clothes, her hands, her 
arms, — down like a ball, bounding, bouncing, 
blinded, bewildered. 


212 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


If it had been four hundred feet, there is no 
doubt she would have gone just the same. It 
proved to be only ten, and she landed some- 
where on a patch of soft grass, except for her 
scratches and a bruise or two, quite unhurt. 

Something lay there beside her, flat upon the 
ground. It was Joy. She lay perfectly still. 

A horrible fear came over Gypsy. She crept 
up on her hands and knees, trying to see her 
face through the dark, and just then Joy moaned 
faintly. Gypsy’s heart gave a great thump. 
In that moment, in the moment of that horrible 
fear and that great relief, Gypsy knew for the 
first time that she loved Joy, and how much. 

“ It’s my ankle,” moaned Joy ; “it must be 
broken, — I know it’s broken.” 

It was not broken, but very badly sprained. 

“ Can you stand on it?” asked Gypsy, her 
face almost as pale as Joy’s. 

Joy tried to get to her feet, but fell heavily, 
with a cry of pain. 


WE ARE lost! 


213 


Gypsy looked around her with dismay. 
Above, the ten feet of rock shot steepl}^ ; across 
the gully towered a high , dark wall ; at each 
end, shelving stones were piled upon each other. 
They had fallen into a sort of unroofed cave, — 
a hollow, shut in completely and impassably. 
Impassably to Joy ; there could be no doubt 
about that. To leave her there alone was out 
of the question. There was but one tiling to 
be done ; there was no alternative. 

“We must stay here all night,” said Gypsy, 
slowly. She had scarcely finished her sentence 
when she sprang up, her lips parted and white. 

“Joy, see, see I what is that?” 

“What? Where?” asked Joy between her 
sobs. 

‘ ‘ There ! Mt that smoJce ? ” 

A distinct, crackling sound answered her, as 
of something' fiercely licking up the dead leaves 
and twigs, — a fearful sound to hear in a great 
forest. At the same instant a white cloud of 


214 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


smoke puffed down almost into their faces. 
Before they had time to stir or cry out, a great 
jet of yellow flame shot up on the edge of the 
cliff, glared far into the shadow of the forest, 
lighted up the ravine with an awful brightness. 

The mountain was on fire, 

Gypsy sat for the instant without speaking or 
moving. She seemed to herself to have no 
words to say, no power of motion. She knew 
far better than Joy what those five words meant. 
A dim remembrance came to her — and it was 
horrible that it should come to her just thSn — 
of something she had seen when she was a very 
little girl, and never forgotten, and never would 
forget. A mountain burning for weeks, and a 
woman lost on -it ; all the town turned out in an 
agony of search ; the fires out one day, and a 
slow procession winding down the blank, 
charred slope, bearing something closely cov- 
ered, that no one looked upon. 

She sprang up in an agony of terror. 


WE AKE LOST I 


215 


“Oh, Joy, carCt you walk? We shall die 
here ! We shall be burned to death ! ” 

At that moment a flaming branch fell hissing 
into a little pool at the bottom of the gully. It 
passed so near them that it singed a lock of 
Gypsy^s hair. 

Joy crawled to her feet, fell, crawled up 
again, fell again. 

Gypsy seized her in both arms, and dragged 
her across the gully. Joy was taller than her- 
self, and nearly as heavy. How she did it she 
never knew. Terror gave her a flash of that 
sort of strength which we sometimes find among 
the insane. 

She laid Joy down in a corner of the ravine 
the furthest removed from the fire ; she could 
not havewcarried her another inch. Above and 
all around towered and frowned tlie rocks ; there 
was not so much as a crevice opening between 
them ; there was not a spot that Joy could 
climb. Across, tlie great tongues of flame 


216 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


tossed themselves into the air, and glared 
awfully against the sky which was dark with 
hurrying clouds. The underbrush was all on 
fire ; two huge pine trees were ablaze, their 
branches shooting off hotly now and then like 
rockets. 

When those trees fell they would fall into the 
ravine. 

Gypsy sat down and covered her face. 

Little did Mr. Francis Rowe think what he 
had done, when, strolling along by the ravine 
at twilight, he threw down his half-burnt cigar ; 
threw it down and walked away whistling, and 
has probably never thought of it from that day 
to this. 

Gypsy sat there with her hands before her 
face, and she sat very still. She understood in 
that moment what was coming to her and to 
Joy. Yes, to her as well as to Joy ; for she 
would not leave Joy to die alone. It would be 
an easy thing for her to climb the cliffs ; she 


WE AKE LOST ! 


217 


was agile, fearless, as usedjto the mountains as 
a young chamois, and the ascent as I said, 
though steep, was not high. Once out of that 
gully where death was certain, she would have 
at least a chance of life. The fire if not checked 
would spread rapidly, would chase her down the 
mountain. But that she could escape it she 
thought was probable, if not sure. And life 
was so sweet, so dear. And her mother — poor 
mother, waiting at home, and looking and 
longing for her I 

Gypsy gave a great gulp ; there was such a 
pain in her throat it seemed as if it would 
strangle her. But should she leave Joy, crip- 
pled and helpless, to die alone in this horrible 
place? Should she do it? No, it was through 
her careless fault that they had been brought 
into it. She would stay with Joy. 

‘ ‘ I don’t see as we can do anything,” she 
said, raising lier head. 

“Shall we be burned to death?” shrieked 


218 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Joy. “ Grypsy, Gypsy, shall -we be burned to 
death ? ” 

A huge, hot branch flew into the gully while 
she spoke, hissing as the other had done, into 
the pool. The glare shot deeper and redder 
into the forest, and the great trees writhed in 
the flames like human things. 

The two girls caught each other’s hands. To 
die — to die so horribly I One moment to be 
sitting there, well and strong, so full of warm, 
young life ; the next to lie buried in a hideous 
tangle of fallen, flaming trunks, their bodies 
consuming to a little heap of ashes that the wind 
would blow away to-morrow morning; their 
souls — where ? 

‘ ‘ I wish I’d said my prayers every day,” 
sobbed Joy, weakly. “ I wish I’d been a good 

girl!” 

“ Let’s say them now, Joy. Let’s ask Him 
to stop the fire. If He can’t, maybe He’U let 
us go to heaven any way.” 


WE ARE lost! 


219 


So Gypsy knelt down on the rocks that were 
becoming liot now to the touch, and began the 
fii’st words that came to her, — “Our Father 
which art in Heaven,” and faltered in them, 
sobbing, and began again, and went through 
somehow to the end. 

After that, they were still a moment. 

“ Joy,” said Gypsy th^n, faintly, “ IVe been 
real ugly to you since you’ve been at our 
house.” 

“ I’ve scolded you, too, *a lot, and made fun 
of your things. I wish I hadn’t.” 

“ If we could. only get out of here. I’d never 
be cross to you as long as ever I live, and I 
wish you’d please to forgive me.” 

“ I will if — if you’ll forgive me, you know. 
Oh, Gypsy, it’s growing so hot over here I ” 

“ Kiss me,- Joy.” 

They kissed each other, through their sobs. 

“ Mother’s in the parlor now, watching for 
us, and Tom and — ” 


220 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Gypsy’s sentence was never finished. There 
was a great blazing and crackling, and one of 
the trees fell, swooping down vdth a crash. It 
fell across the ravine, lying there, a bridge of 
flame, and lighting the underbrush upon the 
opposite side. One tree stood yet. That 
would fall when it fell, directly into the corner 
of the gully where the girls weie crouched up 
against the rocks. And then Joy remembered 
what in her terror she had not thought of be- 
fore. 

‘ ‘ Gypsy, you can climb ! don’t stay here with 
me. What are you staying for ? ” 

“ You needn’t talk about that,” said Gypsy, 
with faltering voice ; “ if it hadn’t been for me 
you wouldn’t be here. I’m not going to sneak 
off and leave you, — not any such a thing ! ” 
Whether Gypsy would have kept this re- 
solve — and very like Gypsy it was, to make 
it — when the flames were actually upon her ; 
whether, indeed, she ought to have kept it, are 


WE ARE lost! 


221 


questions open to discussion. Something hap- 
pened just then that saved her the trouble of 
deciding. It was nothing but a clap of thun- 
der, to be sure, but I wonder if you have any 
idea how it sounded to those two girls. 

It was a tremendous peal, and it was followed 
by a fierce lightning-flash and a second peal, 
and then by something that the girls stretched 
out their arms to with a great cry, as if it had 
been an angel from heaven. A shower almost 
like the bursting of a cloud, — great, pelting 
drops, hissing down upon the burning brush, 
upon the bridge of fire, upon the flaming tree ; 
it seemed like a solid sheet of water ; as if the 
very flood-gates of heaven were open. 

The cruel fire hissed and sputtered, and shot 
up in angry jets, and died in puffs of sullen 
smoke ; the glaring bridge blackened slowly ; 
the pine-tree, swayed by the sudden winds, fell' 
into the forest, and the ravine was safe. The 


222 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


flames, though not quenched, — it might take 
hours to do that, — were thoroughly checked. 

And who was that with white, set face, and 
outstretched hands, springing over the smoking 
logs, leaping down into the ravine ? 

“Oh, Tom, Tom I Oh, father, here we 


CHAPTEE XI. 


GRAND TIMES. 


1^0 go to JVYasliington? ” 

“ Go to Washington ! ” 

“ Did you ever ? ” 

“ Never ! ” 

“ See the President.” 

“ And the White House and the soldiers.” 

“ And the donkeys and all.” 

“I know it.” 

“ Father Breynton, if you’re not just magnif- 
icent ! ” 


This classical conversation took place on a 
certain W ednesday morning in that golden June 
which the picnic ushered in. And such a hur- 
rying and scampering, and mending and making 


223 


224 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


of dresses, such a trimming of summer hats 
and packing of trunks and valises, as there was 
the rest of that week I 

“ You’d better believe we’re busy,” Gypsy 
observed, with a very superior air, to Mrs. 
Surly, who had “just dropped in to find out 
what that fiyaway Gypsy had been screechin’ 
round the house so for, these two days past.” 

“ You’d better believe we have enough to do. 
Joy’s got two white skirts to have tucked in 
little bits of tucks, and she’s sent to Boston for 
a new veil. Mother’s made me a whole new 
dress to wear in the cars, and I’ve got a hemi-- 
tiful brown feather for my turban. Besides, 
we’re going to see the President, and what do 
you think? Father says there are ever so many 
mules in Washington. Wont I sit at the win- 
dows and see ’em go by ! ” 

Thursday, Friday, Saturday passed ; Sunday 
began and ended in a rain-storm ; Monday came 
like a dream, with warm, sweet winds, and 


GRAND TIMES. 


225 


dewdrops quivering in a blaze of unclouded 
light. Like a dream it seemed to the girls to be 
hurrying away at five o’clock, from an unfin- 
ished breakfast, from Mrs. Breynton’s gentle 
good-by, Tom’s valuable patronage and advice, 
and Winnie’s reminder that he was five years 
old, and that to the candid mind it was perfectly 
clear that he ought to go too-o-oo.” 

Very much like a dream was it, to be walking 
on the platform at the station, in the tucked 
skirts and new brown feather; to watch the 
checking of the trunks and buying of the tick- 
ets, quite certain that they were different from 
all other checks and tickets ; to find how inter- 
esting the framed railway and steamboat guide 
for the Continent, on the walls of the little 
dingy ladies’ room, suddenly became, — at 
least, until the pleasing discovery that it was 
printed in 1849, and gave minute directions for 
reaching the Territory of Califorrfia. 

More like a dream was it, to watch the people 


15 


*226 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


that lounged or worked about the depot ; the 
ticket-master, who had stood shut up there just 
so behind the little window for twenty years ; 
the baggage-master, who tossed about their 
trunks without even thinking of the jewelry- 
boxes inside, and that cologne-bottle with the 
shaky cork ; the cross-eyed woman with her 
knitting-work, who sold sponge-cake and candy 
beliind a very small counter ; the small boys in 
singularly airy jackets, who were putting pins 
and marbles on the track for the train to run 
over ; the old woman across the street, who was 
hanging put her clothes to dry in the back yard, 
just as if it had been nothing but a common 
Monday, and nobody had been going to Wash- 
ington ; — how strange it seemed that they 
could all be living on and on just as they did 
every day ! 

“ Oh, just think ! ” said Gypsy, with wide- 
open eyes. “ Did you ever? Isn’t it funny? 
Oh, I wish they could go ojff and have a good 

c- • 

time too.” 


GRAND TIMES. 


227 


Still like a dream did it seem, when the train 
shrieked up and shrieked them away, over and 
down the mountains, through sunlight and 
shadow, by forest and river, past village and 
town and city, away like an arrow, with York- 
bury out of sight and out of mind, and only 
the wonderful, untried days that were coming, 
to think about, — ah, who would think of any- 
thing else, that could have^such days? 

Gypsy made her entrance into Boston in a 
very distingue style. It chanced that just after 
they left Fitchburg, she espied the stone pier of 
an unfinished bridge, surmounted by a remark- 
able boy standing on his head. Up went the 
car-window, and out went her own head and 
one shoulder, the better to obtain a view of the 
phenomenon. 

“Look out, Gypsy,” said her father, unea- 
sily. “If another train should come along, 
that is very dangerous.” 

“ Yes, sir,” said Gypsy, with a twinkle in her 
eye, “ I am looking out.” 


228 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Now, as Mr. Breynton had been on the con- 
tinual worry about her ever since they left York- 
bury, afraid she would catch cold in the draft, 
lose her glove out of the window, go out on the 
platform, or fall in stepping from car to car, 
Gypsy did not pay the immediate heed to his 
warning that she ought to have done. Before 
he had time to speak again, puff! came a sharp 
gust of wind and away went her pretty turban 
with its new brown feather, — over the bridge 
and down into the river. 

“ There I ” said Joy. 

“ Gypsy, my dear ! ” said her father. 

“ Well, any way,” said Gypsy, drawing in 
her head in the utmost astonishment, “ I can 
wear a handkerchief.” 

So into Boston she came, with nothing but a 
handkerchief tied over her brio^ht tossing^ hair. 

o o 

You ought to have seen the hackmen laugh I 

The girls had made an agreement with Mrs. 
Breynton to keep a journal while they were 


GRAND TIMES. 


229 


gone ; send her what they could, and read the 
rest of it to her when they came home. She 
thought in this way they would remember what 
they saw more easily, and witli much less con- 
fusion and mistake. These jouimals will give 
you a better account of their journey than I can 
do. 

They wrote first from New York. This is 
what Joy had to say ; — 

I) 

“ JSTew York, June 17, — Tuesday night. 

“Oh, I’m so tired! We’ve been ‘on the 
go ’ all day. You see we got into Boston last 
night, and took the boat you know, just as we 
expected to. I’ve been on so forty times with 
father ; he used to take me ever so often when 
he went on business ; so I was just as used to 
it, and went right to sleep ; but Gypsy, you 
know, she’s never been to New York any way, 
and never was on a steamer, and you ought to 
have seen her keep hopping up in her berth to 


230 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


look at things and listen to things ! I expected 
as much as could be she’d fall down on me, — 
I had the under berth, — and I don’t believe she 
slept very much. I don’t care so much about 
New York as she does, either, because I’ve seen 
it all. Uncle thought we’d stay here a day so 
as to look about. He wanted Gypsy to see 
some pictures and things. To-morrow morning 
real early we go to Philadelphia. You don’t 
know what a lovely bonnet I saw up Fifth 
Avenue to-day. It was white crape, with the 
dearest little loves of forget-me-nots outside and 
in, and then a white veil. I’m going to make 
father buy me one just like it as soon as I go 
out of mourning. 

“ I expect this isn’t very much like a journal, 
but I’m terribly sleepy, and I guess I must go 
to bed.” 

GYPSY’S JOURNAL. 

“ Brevooet House, Tuesday Night. 

“ Mother, Mother Breynton ! I never had 


GRAND TIMES. 


231 


such a good time in all my life. Oh, I forgot 
to say I haven’t any more idea how to write a 
journal than the man in the moon. I meant to 
put that at the beginning so you’d know. 

“ Well, we came on by boat, and you’ve no 
idea how that machinery squeaked. I laughed 
and laughed, and I kept waking up and laugh- 
ing. 

“ Then — oh, did Joy tell you about my hat? 
I suppose you’ll be sorry, but I don’t believe 
you can help laughing possibly. I just lost it 
out of tlie car window, looking at a boy out in 
the river standing on its head. I mean the boy 
was on liis head, not the river, and I had to 
come into Boston tied up in a handkerchief. 
Father hurried off to get me a new hat, ’cause 
there wasn’t any time for me to go with him, 
and what do you suppose he bought? I don’t 
think you’d ever get over it, if you were to see 
it. It was a white turban with a black edge 
rolled up, and a great fringe o/' blue heads, and 


232 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


a gi een feather ! He said he bought it at the 
first milliner’s he came to, and I should think he 
did. I guess you’d better believe I felt nice going 
all the way to New York in it. This morning 
I ripped off the blue fringe the very first thing, 
and went into Broadway (isn’t it a big street? 
and I never saw such tall policemen with so many 
whiskers and such a lot of ladies to be helped 
across) and bought some black velvet ribbon 
with a white edge to match the straw ; the green 
feather wasn’t nice enough to wear. I knew I 
oughtn’t to have lost the other, and father paid 
five dollars for this horrid old thing, so I 
thought I wouldn’t take it to a milliner. I just 
trimmed it up myself in a rosette, and it doesn’t 
look so badly after all. But oh, my pretty 
brown feather ! Isn’t it a shame ? 

“Father took us to the A spin wall picture- 
gallery to-day. Joy didn’t care about it, but I 
liked it ever so much, only there were ever so 
many Virgin Marys up in the clouds, that 


GRAND TIMES. 


233 


looked as if they’d been washed out and huns: 
up to dry. Besides, I didn’t understand what 
all the little angels were kicking at. Father 
said they were from the old masters, and there 
was a lady with a pink parasol, that screamed 
right out, and said they were sweet pretty. I 
suppose when I’m grown up I shall have to 
think so too. I saw a picture of a little boy 
out in the woods, asleep, that I liked ever so 
much better, 

“ We’ve seen ever so many other things, but 
I haven’t half time to tell you about them all. 

“We’re at the Brevoort House, and I tell 
you I was frightened when I first came in, it’s 
so handsome. We take our rooms, and then 
just go down into the most splendid dining-hall, 
and sit down at little tables and- order what we 
want, and don’t pay for anything but that. 
Father says it’s the European plan. Our ‘rooms 
are beautiful. Don’t you tell anybody, but I’m 
almost afraid of the waiters and chamber- 


234 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


maids ; they look as if they felt so grand. But 
Joy, she just rings the bell and makes them 
bring her up some water, and orders them round 
like anything. Joy wanted to go to the Fifth 
Avenue Hotel, but father said it was too noisy. 
He says this is noisy enough, but he wanted us 
to see what a handsome hotel is like, and — 
and — why ! I’m almost asleep.” 

JOY’S JOURNAL. 

“ Philadelphia, Wednesday, June 18. 

“We came to Philadelphia this morning, 
and we almost choked with the dust, riding 
through New Jersey. We’re at a boarding- 
house, — a new one just opened. They call it 
the Markoe House. (I haven’t the least idea 
whether I’ve spelled it right.) Uncle didn’t 
sleep very well last night, so he wanted a quiet 
place, and thought the hotels were noisy. He 
thought once of going to La Pierre, but gave 
it up. Father used to go to the Continental, I 


GRAND TIMES. 


235 


know, because I’ve heard him say so. I’m too 
tired to write any more,” 

GYPSY’S JOURNAL. 

“ Thursday, June sometliing or other. 

“We stayed over a day here, -f— oh, ‘ here’ 
is Philadelphia, — because father wanted us to 
see the city. It’s real funny. People have 
white wooden shutters outside their windows, 
and when anybody dies they keep a black ribbon 
hanjrino: out on them. Then the streets are so 
broad. I saw four Quakers this morning. 

c 

We’ve been out to see Girard College, where 
they take care of orphans, and the man that 
built it, Mr. Stephen Girard, he wouldn’t ever 
let any minister step inside of it. Wasn’t it 
funny in him ? 

“ Then we went over to Fairmount, besides. 
Fairmount is where they bring up the water 
from the Schuylkill river, to supply the city. 
There is machinery to force it up — great 


236 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


wheels and thinsrs. Then it makes a sort of a 
pond on top of a hill, and there are statues and 
trees, and it’s real beautiful. 

“Father wanted to take us out to Laurel 
Hill ; — that’s the cemetery, he says, very 
much like Mount Auburn, near Boston, where 
Aunt Miranda is buried. But we shan’t have 
time.” 

GYPSY’S JOURNAL. 

“Friday Night. 

“ In Washington I in Washington ! and I’m 
too sleepy to write a thing about it.” 


CHAPTER XII. 


A TELEGRAM, 



JOY’S JOUR NAL. 

^^^^Saturday, June 21st. 
^ELL, we are here at last, and it is re- 
ally very nice. I didn’t suppose I 
should like it so much ; but there is a 
great deal to be seen. We stopped 
over one train at Baltimore. It rained like 
everything, but uncle wanted us to see the city. 
So we took a hack and drove about, and saw 
Washington’s monument. I suppose I ought 
to describe it, but it was so rainy I didn’t notice 
it very much. I think monuments look like 
big ghosts, and then I’m always afraid they’ll 
tumble over on me. 


237 


238 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


‘ ‘ Grjpsy said she wondered whether George 
Washin<2:ton ever looked down out of heaven to 
see the monuments, and cities, and towns, and 
all the things that are named after him, and 
what he thought about it. Wasn’t it queer 
in her ? 

“We stopped at a great cathedral there is in 
Baltimore, too. It was very handsome, only 
so dark. I saw some Irish women saying 
their prayers round in the pews, and there was 
a dish of holy water by the door, and they all 
dipped their fingers in it and crossed themselves 
as they went in and out. 

“We saw ever so many negroes in Balti- 
more, too. From the time you get to Philadel- 
phia on to Washington, there are ever so 
many ; it’s so different from New England. 
I never saw so many there in all my life as we 
have seen these few days. Gypsy doubled up 
her fist and looked real angry when she saw 
them sometimes, and said, “ Just to think ! 


A TELEGRAM. 


239 


perhaps that man is a slave, or that little girl I * 
But I never thought about it somehow. To- 
morrow I will write about Washington. Bal- 
timore has taken up all my room.” 

GYPSY’S JOURNAL. 

Willard’s Hotel, Saturday Night. 

“You ought to have seen the yellow omnibus 
^ we came up from the depot in ! Such a looJc- 
ing thing ! It was ever so long, something 
like a square stove pipe, pulled out ; and it was 
real crowded, and the way it jolted ! There - 
were several of them there waiting for the pas- 
sengers. I should think they might have some 
decent, comfortable horse-cars, the way they do 
in other cities. I think it’s very nice at Phil- 
adelphia. They come to the depots at every 
train, and go down at every train. Father says 
the horse -car arrangements are better in Phil- 
adelphia than they are in Boston or New York. 

“ It seems very funny here, to be in a city 


240 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


that is under military rule. There are a great 
many soldiers, and barracks where they sleep ; 
and a great many tents too. There are forts, 
father says, all around the city, and Monday 
we can see some of them. While we were rid- 
ing up from the depot I saw six soldiers march- 
ing along with a Eebel prisoner. Father says 
they found him hanging around the Capitol, 
and that he was a Eebel spy. He had on a 
ragged coat, and a great many black whiskers, 
and he was swearing terribly. I didn’t feel 
sorry for him a bit, and I hope they’ll hang 
him, or shoot him, or something; but father 
says he doesn’t know. 

‘‘We are at Willard’s Hotel. Father came 
here for the same reason he went to the Bre- 
voort, — so we might see what it was like. It 
is very large, and so many stairs I and such 
long dining-tables, and so many men eating at 
them. We didn’t have as nice a supper as we 
did in New York. 


A TELEGRAM. 


241 


“ It is late now, and tlie lamps are lighted in 
the street. I can see from the window the 
people hurrying by, and some soldiers, and one 
funny little tired mule drawing a great wagon 
of something. 

‘ ‘ There ! he’s stopped and wont move an 
inch, and the man is whipping him awfully. 
The wicked old thing \ * * * * * 

“ I was just going to open the window and 
tell him to stop, but father says I musn’t. 

“As we rode up from the depot, I saw a 
great round dim thing away ^ in the dark. 
Father says it is the dome of the Capitol.” 

t 

GYPSY’S JOURNAL. 

“After Sundown, Sunday Night. 

‘ ‘ Father says it isn’t any harm to write a 
little about what we saw to-day, because we 
haven’t been anywhere but to church. 

‘ ‘ The horrid old gong woke me up real 
early this morning. I should have thought it 


16 


242 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


very late at home, but they don’t have breakfast 
in hotels till eight o’clock hardly ever, and you 
can get up all along till eleven, just as you 
like. This morning we were so tired that we 
didn’t want to get up a bit. 

“ There was a waiter at the table that tipped 
over a great plateful of beefsteak and gravy 
right on to a lady’s blue silk morning-dress. 
She was a Senator’s wife, and she jumped like 
anything. Joy said, ‘ What a shame ! ’ but 
I think it’s real silly in people to wear blue 
silk morning-dresses, because then you can’t 
wear anything any nicer, and you won’t feel 
dressed up in the afternoon a bit. — Oh, I for- 
got ! this isn’t Sunday ! 

“ Well, we all went to church this morn in sr 
to Dr. Gurley’s church. Dr. Gurley is a Pres- 
byterian, father says. I don’t care anything 
about that, but I thought you might. That is 
the church President Lincoln goes to, and we 
went there so as to see him. 


A TELEGRAM. 


243 


“ He sat clear up in front, and I couldn’t see 
anything all through the sermon but the back 
of his head. We sat ’most down by the door 
Besides, there was a little boy in the pew next 
ours that kept opening his father’s umbrella 
right over the top of the pew, and made me 
laugh. Pie was just about as big as Winnie. 
Oh, they say slip here instead of pew, just as 
they do in Boston. I don’t see what’s the use. 
Joy doesn’t like it because I keep saying pew. 
She says it’s countrified. I think one is just 
as good as another. 

“ Well, you see, we just waited, and father 
looked at the minister, and Joy and I kept 
watching the President’s Idd gloves. They 
were black because he’s in mourning for his 
little boy, and he kept putting his hand to his 
face a great deal. He moved round too, 
ever so much. I kept thinking how tired he 
was, working away all the week, taking care 
of those great armies, and being scolded when 


244 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


we got beaten, just as if it were all his fault. 
I think it is real good in him to come to church 
anyway. If I were President and had so much 
to do, and got so tired, I’d stay at home Sun- 
days and go to sleep, — if you’d let me. I 
think President Lincoln must be a very good 
man. I’m sure he is, and I’ll tell you why. 

“ After church we waited so as to see him. 
There were ever so many strangers sitting there 
together, — about fifty I should say, but father 
laughed and said twenty. Well, we all stood 
up, and he began to walk down the aisle with 
his wife, and I saw his face, and he isn’t home- 
ly, but he looks real kind, and — oh, mother ! 
so sobej* and sad I and I know he’s a good man, 
and that’s why. 

“Mrs. Lincoln was dressed all in black, 
with a long crape veil. She kind of peeked 
out under it, but I couldn’t see her very well, 
and I didn’t think much about her because I 
was looking at him. 


A TELEGRAM. 


245 


“Well then, you see there were some people 
in front of me, and I couldn’t see very well, so 
I just stepped up on a cricket so’s to be tall, 
and what do you think ? When the President 
was opposite, just opposite, and looked round 
at us, that old cricket had to tip over, and 
down I went, flat, in the bottom of the pew ! 

“ I guess my cheeks were as red as two beets 
when I got up ; and the President saw me, 
and he looked right at me, — right into my 
eyes and laughed. He did now, really, and he 
looked as if he couldn’t help it possibly. 

“ When he laughs it looks like a little sun- 
beam or something, running all over his face. 

“ Father says we shan’t probably see him 
again. They don’t have any receptions now at 
the White House, because they are in mourn- 
ing. 

“We went to a Quaker meeting this after- 
noon, but there isn’t any time to tell about 


246 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


JOY’S JOURNAL. 

Monday, June 23. 

“ Oh dear me I We’ve seen so much to-day 
I can’t remember half of it. I shall write what 
I can, and Gypsy may write the rest. 

“ In the first place we went to the Capitol. 
It’s built of white marble, and it’s very large. 
There are quantities of long steps on different 
sides of it, and so many doors, and passages, 
and rooms, and pillars. I never could find my 
way out, in the world, alone. I wonder the 
Senators don’t get lost sometimes. 

“ About the first place you come into is a 
round room, called the rotunda. Uncle says 
rotunda means round. There are some pictures 
there. One of them is Washington crossing 
the Delaware, with great cakes of ice beating 
up against the boat. One of the men has a 
flag in his hand. Gypsy and I liked it ever so 
much. 

“ Oh ! — the dome of the Capitol isn’t quite 


A TELEGRAM. 


247 


finished. There is scaffolding up there, and it 
doesn’t look very pretty. 

“Well, then we went up stairs, and I never 
saw such handsome stairs ! They are marble, 
and so wide ! and the banisters are the most 
elegant variegated marble, — a sort of dark 
brown, and they are so broad ! Why, I should 
think they were a foot and a half broad, but 
then I don’t know exactly how much a foot is. 

“We went into two rooms that Gypsy and I 
both liked best of anything. One is called the 
Marble Room, and the other the Fresco Room. 
The Marble Room is all made of marble, — 
walls, floor, window-sills, everything but the 
furniture. The marble is of different colors 
and patterns, and just as beautiful ! The fur- 
niture is covered with drab damask. 

“The Fresco Room is all made of pictures. 
Frescoes are pictures painted on the ceilings. 
Uncle says. He says Michael Angelo, the 
great sculptor and artist, used to paint a great 


248 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


many, and that they are very beautiful. He 
says he had to lie flat on scafibldings, while he 
was painting the domes of great churches, and 
that, by looking up so, in that position, he hurt 
his eyes very much. This room I started to 
tell about, is real pretty. I’ve almost forgotten 
what the furniture is covered with. Seems to 
me it is yellow damask, or else it’s the Marble 
Room that’s yellow, and this is drab, — or else 
— I declare ! We’ve seen so much to-day. I’ve 
got everything mixed up ! 

“ Uncle has just been correcting our journals, 
and he says it isn’t proper to say ‘ I’ve got,’ 
but I ought to say ‘ I have.’ 

“ Oh, I forgot to say that the Senators’ wives 
and daughters who are boarding here, are very 
stylish people. When I grow up I mean to 
marry a Senator, and come to Washington, and 
give great parties. 

“ I don’t see why I don’t hear from father. 
You know it’s nearly three weeks now since I 


A TELEGRAM. 


249 


had a letter. I thought I should have one last 
week, just as much as could be.” 

GYPSY’S JOURNAL. 

Eight o’clock, Monday Night. 

“ Joy has told ever so much about the Cap- 
itol, and I don’t want to tell it all over again. 
If I forget it, I can look at her journal you 
know. 

“ But she didn’t tell about Congress. Well, 
you see if we’d come a little later we shouldn’t 
have seen them at all ; and if it didn’t happen 
to be a long session we shouldn’t see them so 
late in the season. But then we did. I’m very 
glad, only I thought it was rather stupid. 

“ I liked the halls, any way. They’re splen- 
did, only there’s a great deal of yellow about 
them ; and then there are some places for pic- 
tures, and the pictures aren’t put up yet. 

“ There’s a gallery runs round, where visitors 
sit. The Senators and Representatives are 


250 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


down on the floor. We went into the Senate 
first. They sat in seats that curved round, and 
the President of the Senate, — that’s Vice- 
President Hamlin, — he sits in a sort of little 
pulpit, and looks after things. If anybody 
wants to speak, they have to ask him, and he 
says, ‘ The Senator from so-and-so has the 
floor.’ Then when they get into a fight, he has 
to settle it. Isn’t it funny, in such great grown- 
up men to quarrel? But they do, like every- 
thing. There was one man got real mad at 
Mr. Sumner to-day. 

‘ ‘ I didn’t care about what they were talking 
about, but it was fun to look down and see all the 
desks and papers, and some of them were just 
as sleepy as could be. Then they kept whisper- 
ing to each other while a man was speaking, and 
sometimes they talked right out loud. If I 
should do that at school, I guess Miss Cardrew 
would give it to me. But what I thought was 
queerest of all, they all talked right at the Vice- 


A TELEGRAM. 


251 


President, and kept saying ‘ Mr. President, ’ 
and ‘ Sir,’ just as if there weren’t anybody else 
in the room. 

“ Some of the Senators are handsome, and a 
good many more aren’t. Joy stood up for Mr. 
Sumner because he came from Massachusetts. 
He is a nice-looking man, and I had to say so. 
He has a high forehead, and he looks exactly 
like a gentleman. Besides, father says he has 
done a noble work for the country and the 
slaves, and the rest of New England ought to 
be just as proud of him as Massachusetts. 

“We went into the House of Representa- 
tives, too, and it was a great deal noisier there 
than it was in the Senate, there were so many 
more of them. I saw one man eating peanuts. 
JMost all of them looked hungry. The man 
that sits up behind the desk and takes care of 
the House, is called the Speaker. I think it’s 
real fiinny, because he never makes a speech. 
As we came out of the Capitol, father turned 


252 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


round and looked back and said, ‘ Just think ! 
All the laws that govern this great country come 
out from there.’ He said some more about it, 
too, but there was the funniest little negro boy 
peeking through the fence, and I didn’t hear. 

“We went to the White House next. 
Father says it’s something like a palace, only 
some palaces are handsomer. It’s white marble 
like the Capitol. We went up the steps, and a 
man let us right in. We saw two rooms. One 
is called the Ked Room and one the Green 
Room. The Red Room is furnished in red 
damask and the Green is all green. They were 
very handsome, only all the furniture was ranged 
along the walls, and that made it seem so big 
and empty. Father says that’s because these 
rooms are used for receptions, and there is such 
a crowd. 

“ There is a Blue Room, too, that visitors 
are sometimes let into. Father asked the door- 
keeper ; but he said, ‘ The family were at break- 


A TELEGRAM. 


253 


fast in it.^ That was eleven • dclock I I guess 
I^d like to be a President’s daughter, and not 
have to get up. We didn’t see anything more 
of President Lincoln. 

“ We’ve been going all day, and we’ve been 
to the Patent Office and the Smithsonian Insti- 
tute, but I’m too tired to say anything about 
them.” 

GYPSY’S JOURi^AL. 

“Tuesday. 

“We’ve been over to Alexandria — that’s 
across the Potomac Piver — in the funniest 
little steamboat you ever saw. When you 
went in or came out from the cabin, you had to 
crawl under a stove-pipe. It wasn’t high 
enouofh to walk straio’ht. I don’t like Alexan- 
dria. It’s all mud and secessionists. People 
looked cross, and Joy was afraid they’d shoot 
us. AVe saw the house where Col. Ellsworth 
was shot at the beginning of the war. The 


254 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


man was very polite, and showed us round. 
The plastering around the place where he fell, 
and all the stairs, had been cut away by people 
as relics. We saw the church where Gen. 
Washington used to go, too.” 

JOY’S JOURNAL. 

“ Wednesday Night. 

“We are just home from Mount Vernon, 
and we’ve had a splendid time. We went in a 
steamboat; it’s some ways from Washington. 
You can go by land, if you want to. It was 
real pleasant. Gen. Washington’s house was 
there, — a queer, low old place, and we went 
all over it. There was a nice garden, and 
beautiful grounds, with woods clear down to the 
water. He is buried on the place under a 
marble tomb, with a sort of brick slied all 
around it. There is nothing on the tomb but 
the word Washington. His wife is buried by 
him, and it says on hers, Martha, Consort of 


A TELEGRAM. 


255 


Washington. All the gentlemen took off 
their hats while we stood there. To-morrow 
we are going to Manassas, if there is a boat. 
Uncle is going to see. I am having a splendid 
time. Won’t it be nice telling father all about 
it when he comes home ? ” 

Joy laid down her pen suddenly. She heard 
a strange noise in her uncle’s room where he and 
Gypsy were sitting. It was a sort of cry, — a 
low, smothered cry, as of some one in grief or 
pain. She shut up her portfolio and hurried in. 
Mr. Breynton held a paper in his hand. Gypsy 
was looking over his shoulder, and her face was 
very pale. 

‘ ‘ What is it ? What’s the matter ? ” 

Nobody answered. 

“What’s happened?” repeated Joy, impa- 
tiently. 

!Mr. Breynton turned away his face. Gypsy 
broke out crying. 

“ Why, what is the matter? ” said Joy, look- 
ing alarmed. 


256 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ Joy, my poor child — ’’began her uncle. 
But Gypsy sprang forward suddenly, and threw 
her arms around Joy’s neck. 

“ Oh, Joy, Joy, — your father ! ” 

‘ ‘ Let me see that paper I ” Joy eaught it 
before they could stop her, opened it, read it, — 
dropped it slowly. It was a telegram from 
Yorkbury : — 

‘ ‘ Boston papers say Joy^s father died in France 
two weeks ago** 


CHAPTEE XIII. 


A SUNDAY NIGHT. 



HEY were all together in the parlor at 
^ * Yorkbury, — Joy very still, with her 
head in her auntie’s lap. It was two 
weeks now since that night when she 
sat writing in her journal at Washington, and 
planning so happily for the trip to Manassas 
that had never been taken. 

They had been able to learn little about her 
father’s death as yet. A Paris paper reported, 
and Boston papers copied, the statement that 
an American of . his name, stopping at an 
obscure French town, was missing for two 
days, and found on the third, murdered, robbed, 
horribly disfigured. Mr. George Breynton had 
257 


17 



258 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


been travelling alone in the interior of the 
country, and had written home that he should 
be in this town — St. Pierre — at precisely the 
time given as the date of the American’s death. 
So his long silence was awfully explained to 
Joy. The fact that the branch of his firm with 
which he had frequent business correspondence, 
had not received the least intelligence of him 
for several weeks, left no doubt of the mournful 
truth. Something had gone wrong in the ship- 
ping of certain goods, w^hich had required his 
immediate presence ; they had therefore written 
and telegraphed to him repeatedly, but there 
had been no reply. Day by day the ominous 
silence had shaded inlo alarm, had deepened 
into suspense, had grown into certainty. 

Mr. Breynton had fought against conviction 
as long as he could, had clung to all possibili- 
ties and impossibilities of doubt, but even he 
had given up all hope. 

Dead, — dead, without a sign ; without one 


A SUNDAY NIGHT. 


259 


last word to the child waiting for him across the 
seas ; without one last kiss or blessing ; dead by 
ruffian hands, lying now in an unknown, lonely 
grave. It seemed to Joy as if her, heart must 
break. She tried to fly from the horrible, 
haunting thought, to forget it in her dreams, to 
drown it in her books and play. But she could 
not leave it ; it would not leave her. It must 
he taken down into her heart and kept there ; 
she and it must be always alone together ; no 
one could come between them ; no one could 
help her. 

And so there was nothing to do but take that 
dreary journey home from Washington, come 
quietly back to Yorkbury, come back without 
father or mother, into the home that must be 
hers now, the only one left her in all the wide 
world ; nothing to do but to live on, and never 
to see him any more, never to kiss him, never 
to creep up into his arms, or hear his brave, 
merry voice calling ‘‘ Joyce, Joyce,” as it used 


260 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


to call about the old home. No one called her 
Joyce but her father. No one should ever call 
her so again. 

Tom called her so one day, never thinking. 

‘ ‘ I don’t want to hear that, — not that 
name,” said Joy, flushing suddenly ; then paling 
and turning away. 

She was very still now. Since the first few 
days she seldom cried ; or if she did, it was 
when she was away alone in the dark, with no 
one to see her. She had grown strangely 
silent, strangely gentle and thoughtful for Joy. 
Sorrow was doing for her what it does for so 
many older and better ; and in her frightened, 
childish way, Joy was suffering all that she 
could suffer. 

Perhaps only Gypsy knew just how much it 
was. The two girls had been drawn very near to 
each other these past few weeks. It seemed to 
Gypsy as if the grief were almost her own, she 
felt so sorry for J oy ; she had grown very gentle 


A SUNDAY NIGHT. 


261 


to her, very patient with her, very thoughtful for 
her comfort. They were little ways in which 
she could show this, but these little ways are 
better than any words. When she left her own 
merry play with the girls to hunt up Joy sitting 
somewhere alone and miserable, and coax her 
out into the sunlight, oi; sit beside her and tell 
funny stories till the smiles came wandering 
back against their will to J oy’s pale face ; when 
she slid her strawberry tarts into Joy’s desk at 
recess, or stole up-stairs after her with a handful 
of peppermints bought with her own little 
weekly allowance, or threw her arms around her 
so each night with a single, silent kiss, or came 
up sometimes in the dark and cried with her, 
without saying a word, Joy was not unmindful 
nor ungrateful. She noticed it all, everything ; 
out of her grief she thanked her with all her 
heart, and treasured up in her memory to love 
for all her life the Gypsy of these sad days. 

They were in the parlor together on this 


262 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


Sunday night, as I said, — all except Mr. 
Breynton, who had been for several days in 
Boston, settling liis brother’s affairs, and making 
arrangements to sell the house for Joy ; it was 
her house now, that handsome place in Beacon 
Street, and that seemed so strange, — strange 
to Joy most of all. 

They were grouped around the room in the 
fiiding western light, Gypsy .and Tom together 
by the window, Winnie perched demurely on 
the piano-stool, and Joy on the cricket at Mrs.-' 
Breynton’s feet. The faint light was touching 
her face, and her mournful dress with its heavy 
crape trimmings, — there were no white chenille 
and silver brooches now; Joy liad laid these 
things aside of her own wish. It is a very small 
matter, to be sure, this mourning; but in Joy’s 
case it mirrored "lier real grief very completely. 
The something which she had not felt when her 
mother died, she felt now, to the full. She had 
a sort of notion, — an ignorant, childish notion, 


A SUNDAY NIGHT. 


263 


but very real to her, — that it was wicked to 
wear bows and hair-ribbons now. 

She had been sitting so for some time, with 
her head in her aunt’s lap, quite silent, her eyes 
looking off through the window. 

“ Why not have a little singing? ” said Mrs. 
Breynton, in her pleasant, hushed voice; — it 
was always a little different somehow, Sunday 
nights ; a little more quiet. 

Gypsy went to the piano, and usurped 
Winnie’s throne on the stool, much to that 
young gentleman’s disgust. 

“ What shall it be, mother? ” 

“ Joy’s hymn, dear.” 

Gypsy began, without further explanation, to 
play a low, sweet prelude, and then they sang 
through the hymn that Joy had learned and 
loved in these few desolate weeks : 

“ There is an eye that never sleeps 
Beneath the wing of night ; 

There is an ear that never shuts 
When sink the beams of light. 


264 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


^ “ There is an arm that never tires 

When human strength gives way ; 

There is a love that never fails 
When earthly loves decay.” 

Joy tried to sing, but just there she broke 
down. Gypsy’s voice faltered a little, and Mrs. 
Breynton sang very softly to the end. 

After that they were all still ; Joy had hidden 
her face. Tom began to hum over the tune 
uneasily, in his deep bass. A sudden sob broke 
into it. 

“ This is what makes it, all so different.” 

“What, dear?” 

“The singing, and the prayers, and the 
Sunday nights ; it’s been making me think 
about being a good girl, ever since I’ve been 
here. We never had any at home. Father — ” 

But she did not finish. She rose and went 
over to the western window, away .from the 
rest, where no one could see her face. 

The light was dimming fast ; it was nearly 


) 


A SUNDAY NIGHT. 


265 


dark now, and the crickets were chirping in the 
distant meadows. 

Tom coughed, and came very near trying to 
whistle. Gypsy screwe<^ the piano-stool round 
with a sudden motion, and went over to where 
Joy stood. 

Tom and his mother began to talk in a low 
voice, and the two girls were as if alone. 

The first thing Gypsy did, was to put her 
arms round Joy’s neck and kiss her. Joy hid 
her face on her shoulder and cried softly. 
Then Gypsy choked a little, and for a while 
they cried together. 

, “ You see I am so sorry,” said Gypsy. 

“ I know it, — I know it. Oh, Gypsy, if I 

could see him/ws^ one minute! ” 

Gypsy only gave her a little hug in answer. 

Then presently, as the best thing she could 
think of, to say — 

“ Well go strawberrying to-morrow, and 
111 save you the very best place. Besides, I’ve 


266 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


got a tart up stairs I’ve been saying for you, 
and you can eat it when we go up to bed. I 
tliink things taste real nice in bed. Don’t i 
you ? ” • 

“Look here, Gypsy, do you know I love 
you ever so much ? ” 

“You do ! Well, isn’t that funny? I was 
just thinking how much I loved' you. Besides, 

I’m real glad you’re going to live here always.”. ] 

i 

“ Why, I thought you’d be sorry.” I 

“ I should have once,” said Gypsy honestly, j 
“ But that’s because I was ugly. I don’t think ; 

j 

I could get along without you possibly — no, j 
not any way in the world. Just think howr | 
long we’ve slept together, and what ‘ gales ’ we j 
do get into when our lamp goes out, and we ^ 
can’t find the matches ! You see I never had 
anybody to get into gales with before.” 

Somebody rang the door bell just then, and 
the conversation was broken up. 

“ Joy, have you a mind to go?” asked Mrs. 
Breyton. “ Patty is out, this evening.” 


A SUNDAY NIGHT. 


267 


“ Why! whoever it is, theyVe come right 
in,” said Joy, opening the door. 

A man was there in the entry ; — a man with 
heavy whiskers and a valise. 

The rest of them sitting back there in the 
dark waited, wondering a little wh(> it could be 
coming in Sunday night. And this is what 
they heard, 

“ Joyce, little Joyce ! — why don’t be fright- 
ened, child;. it’s nobody but father.” 


CHAPTER XIV. 


GOOD-BY. 



^HEY were alone together in the quiet 
^ ^ room — Peace Maythorne and Joy. 


The thick yellow sunlight fell in, touch- 
ing the old places, — the wall where 
Gypsy’s blue and golden text was hanging, — a 
little patch of the faded carpet, the bed, and the 
folded hands upon it, and the peaceful face. 

Joy had crept up somewhat timidly into 
Gypsy’s place close by the pillow. She was 
talking, half sadly, half gladly, as if she hardly 
knew whether to laugh or cry. 

“ You see we’re sroins: ri^ht off in this noon 

o O o 

train, and I thought I must come over and say 
good-by.” 


268 


GOOD-BY. 


269 


“ I’m real sorry to have you go, — real.” 

“Are you?” said Joy, looking pleased. 
“ Well, I didn’t suppose you’d care. I do 
believe you care for everybody. Peace.” 

“I try to,” said Peace, smiling. “ You go 
in rather a hurry, don’t you Joy? ” 

“ Yes. It’s just a week since father came. 
He wants to stay a while longer, dreadfully, 
but he says his business at home can’t be put 
off, and of course I am going with him. Do 
you know. Peace, I can’t bear to have him out 
of the room five minutes, I’m so silly. It 
seems all the time as if I were dreaming a real 
beautiful dream, and when I woke up, the awful 
days would come back, and he’d be dead again. 
I keep wanting to kiss him and feel of him all 
the time.” 

“You poor child!” said Peace, her eyes 
dimming a little, “ how strange it all has been. 
How good He’s been to you, — God.” 

“ I know it. I know He has, Peace. 


270 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


W asn’t it queer how it all came about ? Gypsy 
says nobody but God could have managed it so, 
and Auntie says he must have had some very 
good reason.” 

“You see father was sick all that time in a 
little out-of-the way French town wdth not a 
single soul he knew, and nobody to talk Eng- 
lish, and so sick he couldn’t write a word — out 
of his head, he says, all the time. That’s why I 
didn’t hear, nor the firm. Then wasn’t it so 
strange about that man who was murdered at 
St. Pierre ? — the very same name, — George 
Breynton, only it was George W. instead of 
George M; but that they didn’t find out till 
afterwards. Poor man ! I wonder if he has 
anybody crying for him over here. Then you 
know, just as soon as ever father got well 
enough to travel, he started straight home. He 
said he’d had enough of Europe, and if he ever 
lived to get home, he wouldn’t go another time 
without somebody with him. It wasn’t so very 


GOOD-BY. 


271 


pleasant he said, to come so near dying with no- 
body round that you knew, and not to hear a word 
of your own language. Then you know he got 
into Boston Saturday, and he hurried straight 
up here ; but the train only went as far as Rut- 
land, and stopped at midnight. Then you see 
he was so crazy to see me and let me know he 
wasn’t dead, he couldn’t possibly wait; so he 
hired a carriage and drove all the way over 
Sunday. And oh. Peace, when I saw him out 
there in the entry ! ” 

“ I guess you said your prayers that night,” 
said Peace, smiling. 

‘ ‘ I rather guess I did ! And Peace that 
makes me think” — Joy grew suddenly very 
grave ; there was an earnest, thoughtful look in 
her eyes that Joy’s eyes did not have when she 
first came to Yorkbury ; a look that they had 
been slowly learning all this year ; that they 
had been very quickly learning these past few 
weeks — ‘‘ When I get home it’s going to be 


272 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


hard ; — a good many things are going to be 
hard.” 

“ Yes, I see,” said Peace, musingly. Peace 
always seem to see just what other people were 
living and hoping and fearing, without any 
words from them to explain it. 

“ It’s all so different from what it is here. I 
don’t want to forget what you’ve told me and 
Auntie’s told me. Almost everybody I know at 
home doesn’t care for what you do up here in 
Yorkbury. I used to think about dancing- 
school, and birthday parties, and rigging up, 
and summer fashions, and how many diamonds 
I’d have when I was married, and all that, the 
whole of the time. Peace — the whole of it ; 
then I got mad when my dresses didn’t fit, and 
I used to strike Therese and Kate, if you’ll 
believe it — when I was real angry that was. 
Now up here, somehow I’m ashamed wlicn I 
miss at school ; then sometimes I help Auntie a 
little, and sometimes I do try not to be cross. 


GOOD-BY. 


273 


Now you see I’m going back, and father he 
thinks the world of me, and let’s me do every- 
thing I want to, and I’m afraid ” — Joy stopped 
puzzled to express herself — “ I’m afraid I 
shall do every tiling I want to.” 

Peace smiled, and seemed to be thinking. 

“ Then you see I shall grow up a cross, 
old selfish woman,” said Joy dolefully ; “ Auntie 
says people grow selfish, that have everything 
their own way. You see up here there’s been 
Gypsy, and she wanted things just as much as 
I, so there’ve been two ways and that’s the 
thing of it.” 

“ I don’t think you need to grow up selfish,” • 
said Peace, slowly, “ no, I am sure you 
needn’t.” 

“ Well, I wish you’d tell me.how.” 

‘ ‘ Ask Him not to let you,” sAid Peace softly. 
Joy colored. 

“I know it; I’ve thought of that. But 
there’s another trouble. You see father — 


18 


274 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


well, he doesn’t care about those things. He 
never has prayers nor anything, and he used to 
bring me novels to read Sundays. I read them 
then. I’ve got all out of the way of it up here. 
I don’t think I should want to, now.” 

“Joy,” said Peace after a silence, “ I think 

— I guess, you must help your father a little. 
If he sees you doing right, perhaps, — he loves 
you so very much, — perhaps by-and-by he will 
feel differently.” 

Joy made no answer. Her eyes looked off 
dreamily through the window ; her thoughts 
wandered away from Peace and the quiet room 

— away into her future, which the young girl 
seemed to see just then, with grave, prophetic 
glance ; a future of difficulty, struggle, tempta- 
tion ; of old habits and old teachings to be bat- 
tled with ; of new ones to be formed ; of much 
to learn and unlearn, and try, and try again ; 
but perhaps — she still seemed to see with the 
young girl’s earnest eyes that for the moment 


GOOD-BY. 


275 


had quite outgrown the child — a future faith- 
fully lived and well ; not frittered away in beau- 
tiful playing only, but filled up with something ; 
more than that, a future which should be a long 
thank-offering to God for this great mercy He 
had shown her, this great blessing He had given 
her back from the grave ; a future in which, 
perhaps, they two who were so dear to each 
other, should seek Him together — a future that 
He could bless to them both. 

Peace quite understood the look with which 
she turned at last, half sobbing, to kiss her 
good-by. 

“I must go, —it is very late. Thank you, 
Peace. Thank you as long as I live.” 

She looked, back in closing the door, to see 
the quiet face that lay so patiently on the pil- 
low, to see the stillness of the folded hands, to 
see the last, rare smile. 

- She wondered, half guessing the truth, if she 
should ever see it again. She never did. 


276 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


They were all wondering, what had become 
of her, when she came into the house. 

“We start in half an hour Joyce, my dear,’’ 
said her father, catching her up in his arms for 
a kiss ; — he almost always kissed her now, 
when she had been fifteen minutes out of his 
sight, — “We start in half an hour, and you 
won’t have any more than time to eat your 
lunch.” 

Mrs. Breynton had spread one of her very 
. very best lunches on the dining-room table, and 
Joy’s chair was ready and waiting for her, and 
everybody stood around, in that way people 
will stand, when a guest is going away, not 
knowing exactly wdiat to do or what to say, 
but looking very sober. And very sober they 
felt; they had all learned to love Joy in this 
, year she had spent among them, and it was 
dreary enough to see her trunks packed and 
strapped in the entry, and her closet shelves up- 
stairs empty, and all little traces of her about 
the house vanishing fast. 


GOOD-BY. 


277 


‘ ‘ Come along,” said Gypsy in a savage 
undertone, “ Come and eat, and let the rest 
stay out here. IVe hardly set eyes on you all 
the morning. I must have you all • myself 
now.” 

‘ ‘ O hum ! ” said Joy attempting a currant 
tart, and throwing it down with one little semi- 
circular bite in it. “So Tm really off, and this 
is the very last time I shall sit at this table.” 

“ Hush up, if you please ! ” observed Gypsy, 
winking hard, “just eat your tart.” 

Joy cut off a delicate mouthful of the cold 
tongue, and then began to look around the 
room. 

“ The last time I shall see Winnie’s blocks, 
and that little patch of sunshine on the machine, 
and the big Bible on the book-case ! — Oh, 
how I shall think about them all nights, when 
I’m sitting down by the grate at home.” 

‘ ‘ Stop talking about your last times ! It’s 
bad enough to have you go anyway. I don’t 
know what I shall do without you.” 


278 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ I don’t know what I shall do without you, 
I’m sure,” said Joy shaking her head mourn- 
fully, “ but tlien you know, we’re going to 
write to each other twice every single week.” 

“I know it, — every week as long as we 
live, remember.” 

“ Oh, I shan’t forget. I’m going to make 
father buy me some pink paper and envelopes 
with Love stamped up in the corners, on pur- 
pose.” 

“Anyway, it’s a great deal worse for me,” 
said Gypsy, forlornly. “You’re going to Bos- 
ton, and to open the house again and all, and 
have ever so much to think about. I’m just 
going on and on, and you won’t be up stairs 
when I go to bed, and your things won’t ever be 
hanging out on the nails in the entry, and I’ll 
have to go to school alone, and — O dear me !” 

“Yes, I suppose you do have the worst of 
it,” said Joy, feeling a great spasm of magna- 
nimity in bringing herself to say this ; “ but it’s 


GOOD-BY. 


279 


pretty bad for me, and I don’t believe you can 
feel worse than I do. Isn’t it funny in us to 
love each other- so much ? ” 

“ Real,” said Gypsy, trying to laugh, with 
two bright tears rolling down her cheeks. 
Both the girls were thinking just then of Joy’s 
coming to Yorkbury. How strange that it 
should have been so hard for Gypsy ; that it had 
cost her a sacrifice to welcome her cousin ; how 
strange that they could ever have quarrelled so ; 
how strange all those ugly, dark memories of the 
first few months they spent together — the jeal- 
ousy, the selfishness, the dislike of each other, 
the constant fretting and jarring, the longing 
for the time that should separate them. And 
now it had come, and here they sat looking at 
each other and crying — quite sure their hearts 
were broken ! 

The two tears rolled down into Gypsy’s 
smile, and she swallowed them before she 
spoke : 


280 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


“ I do believe it’s all owing to that verse I ” 

‘ ‘ What verse ? ” 

“Why Peace Maythorne’s. 1 suppose she 
and mother would say we’d tried somehow or 
other to prefer one another in honor, you know, 
and that’s the thing of it. Because you see I 
know if I’d always had everything my own 
way, I shouldn’t have liked you a bit, and I’d 
have been real glad when you went off.” 

“ Joyce, Joyce ! ” called her father from the 
entry, “Here's the coach. It’s time to be 
getting ready to cry and kiss all around.” 

“ Oh — hum ! ” said Gypsy. 

“ I know it,” said Joy, not very clear as to 
what she was talking about. “ Where’s my 
bag? Oh, yes. And my parasol ? Oh there’s 
Winnie riding horseback on it. Well, Gypsy, 
go_od— ” 

“ By,” finished Gypsy with a great sob. 
And oh, such a hugging and kissing as there 
was then I ” 


GOOD-BY. 


281 


Then Joy was caught in her Auntie’s arms, 
and Tom’s and Winnie’s all at once, it seemed 
to her, for the coachman was in a very great 
hurry, and by the time she was in the coach 
seated by her father, she found she had quite 
spoiled her new kid gloves, rubbing her eyes. 

“ Good-by,” called Gypsy, waving one of 
Winnie’s old jackets, under the impression that 
it was a handkerchief. 

‘ ‘ Twice every week ! ” 

“ Yes — sure : on pink paper, remember.” 

“ Yes, and envelopes. Good-by. Good- 
by ! ” 

So the last nodding and smiling was over, 
and the coach rattled away, and the house with 
the figures on the steps grew dim and faded 
from sight, imd the train whirled Joy on over 
the mountains — away into that future of which 
she sat thinking in Peace Maythorne’s room ; 
of which she sat thinking now, with earnest 


282 


gypsy’s cousin joy. 


ejesi looking off through the car- window, with 
many brave young hopes, and little fear. 

“ You’d just better come into the dining- 
room,” said Winnie to Gypsy, who was stand- 
ing out in the yard, remarkably interested in 
the lilac-bush, and under the very curious im- 
pression that people thought she wasn’t crying. 
“I think it’s real nice Joy’s gone, ’cause she 
didn’t eat up her luncheon. There’s a piece of 
pounded cake with sugar on top. There were 
three tarts with squince-jelly in ’em too, but 
they — well, they aint’t there now, some ways 
or nuther.” 


m 


©^aluable for tfje ^oung, 

PUBLISHED BY 

GRAVES AND TODNG, 

24 CORNHUiL, boston-. 


THE 

LINDENDALE STORIES. 

BY 

LAWRENCE LANCEWOOD, ESQ. 

•si 

Xo be completed In five 16mo volumes* 

Volume 1, SIDNEY DeGREY; or, the Rival School- 
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Volume 2, NELLIE WARREN. 

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GRAVES AND YOUNG, ' 


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©"alttaMt §o0hs for tijr §'oitnj, 

PUBLISHED BY 

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24 CORNHUjL, BOSTOjJT. 


THE PERCY FAMILY. 


BT 

REV. D. C. EDDY, D.D. 


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This entirely new series is of sterling merit, and cannot fail of 
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16mo. 

Illustrated. 

Volume 

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if 

if 

Volume 

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if 

if 

Volume 

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if 

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if 

a 

Volume 

6, 

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it 


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GRAVES AND YOUNG, 



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